Expanding Horizons
by warhawkc1
Summary: A case of "What If... Earth received assistance from a First One?" In this case instead of being about the Vorlons or Shadows, the race is instead the Kirishiacs. Timeline of events are taken from actual historical events and are matched up to AoG's B5 Wars series fluff text and EFNI's master chronology.
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

**Sol system  
Sol III (aka Terra or Earth)  
Time: irrelevant**

_Here I am watching the world end. All too much has already passed away and now it is time for Sol to go the same way as too many other stars. The life cycle of the universe must go on. I am still somewhat nostalgic of the previous times I walked here rather than flew past. Terrans have come and gone and now even our successor species are branching out into space. The next crop of races has begun to take to the heavens, much as we did when the opportunity presented itself to us. The urge to interfere as the First Ones did with us is strong, but our own desire to see them succeed has made that a moot point. It is a shame to see Terra go away, so many fond memories of the world and the movements that were spawned from it across the galaxy. _

_All that we are now is proof that the First Ones have interfered in our advancement as a species. Even the thrice-damned Vorlons with their attempts at seeding psychic powers attempted to force us into saving their own society. How the mighty have fallen. Even their partners in crime, though they would never admit to that appellation, the Shadows are no more. The Shadows' crime against our mentors has been avenged and they have been erased from history. Perhaps an ending that was too _soft _on our parts, but one that was just indeed._

With a sigh, the individual watched as Terra was slowly consumed as Sol expanded into a Red Giant star. His sensor clusters filtering out the harsh light that showed the work of millennia reduced to nothing as the universe's own life cycle came to an end once more. Floating as he was just outside Terra's gravity field, his body one with his ship, the view brought to mind the first time when things truly changed for Terra's descendants. How time itself had been flipped and torn asunder by the very First Ones who had watched it come into its own. With a quiet chime, the individual watched for a short while later, but his mind was reaching back to the past in remembrance of what had come before…

**Z'ha'dum  
~ 1250 A.D.**

Gathered together once more, before their Great Crusade to finally prove who was _**right**_, the entirety of the Shadows met in psychic congress to discuss their war plans.

"We all know of the attempts by the others to force an end to our discussion. They are short sighted and do not see that without conflict, races cannot become stronger. To that end, we must plan for all contingencies, especially if we are to win the debate."

"We all agree, but what about the usurpers who deigned to attack our realm while we slumbered. What shall we do to avenge this insult?"

The usurpers in the minds of every gathered Shadow were the Kirishiacs. Those who had lead a massively successful invasion of the various First Ones without too many difficulties. The fragmented nature of the various powers had made the Kirishiacs bold enough to attack Z'ha'dum itself, but that also spelled the end of their conquests. The Triad was the first to bring the others notice of the actions of the Kirishiacs, but it went unheeded by the other First Ones. Even the Walkers lost several systems while they were elsewhere mapping only what they found interesting. In this vacuum of responsibility, the Kirishiacs did as they chose. Only the direct intervention of Lorien along with a combined force of Shadow, Walker, Torvalus, Vorlon, and Triad forces were the Kirishiacs removed from their conquered territory. To the previously slumbering Shadows, it proved to be too much for their sensibilities. This rage and motivation for revenge slumbered with them and when they began their Great Crusade against the Vorlons and their thrall races, their own plan to punish the Kirishiacs began.

"It has begun and now the interlopers will be dealt with in a manner most fitting. We have found an unassuming star system with four large worlds to imprison the Lords of Kirish upon. Their ships will be destroyed and their entire population will be moved there. We will place ships nearby on the fourth world and in the moons of the largest of the four largest worlds as guardians."

And so it began… The Kirishiacs were stymied on all fronts by the more powerful Shadow ships and their more powerful Thralls. Reduced in size to a mere handful, they were imprisoned in a star system with a solitary yellow star and nine small planets. Close enough to their previous domain, yet far enough that they could do no more harm, the Shadows exiled every member to the worlds they had selected. Here the Kirishiacs would be watched until such a time that Lorien himself could be brought in to render judgment. The Shadows content in their plans and confident that they had removed the threat of the Kirishiacs went back into their cycle of slumbering. Their dreams, if such beings could dream, were on their eventual triumph over the Vorlons.

For the Kirishiacs, all they had were the thoughts of revenge against the Shadows. Their High Lord and his council were all that truly remained. The Shadows had made the mistake of leaving the council together or maybe it was their sense of rightness that truly caused this lapse by the elder race.

"It is much as we had feared my brothers and sisters. Our fleet is no more and we barely have the sensors that we need" said High Lord Ch'Lorn'a. "We are very fortunate in that the Shadows did not remove our technology, nor did they find the remains of the technology we were able to acquire from the others." Such was this advanced technology, did the Kirishiacs begin to plan their eventual escape from their prisons. They still had communications with the other worlds, but the strange orbital mechanics of the star system soon rendered line-of-sight communications to even smaller windows of opportunity. The few shuttles that tried to launch were all quickly destroyed by the Battle Crabs placed in orbit by the Shadows.

Despair soon began to overtake the once proud race; it would be nearly **640 years** before the Kirishiacs were able to throw off their despair when the unexpected happened. They began to detect crude radio signals coming from the third world. These broadcasts soon were a constant for each of the four worlds of their reduced dominion. With the detection of these signals, High Lord Ch'Lorn'a convened the council once more on the fifth planet.

"We've detected a number of signals coming from closer to the star of this system. Triangulation using our passive sensors has shown that it is coming from the third planet. It looks as though the inhabitants have developed to an important scientific principle. I place before the council a proposal to use these primitives as our revenge tool against the other First Ones and especially the Shadows. We will use our remaining stealth tools taken from the Torvalus and observe the worlds. We will then infiltrate it with agents and impersonate different scientists there to further their understanding of the universe and of science. We will bring them together and into the stars and we will have our revenge against the Shadows!" Such an impassioned speech by the leader had the rest of the council ready to render aid. It was decided that all six members of the council would be present on the shuttle that would travel to the third world, or Earth as it was known by the inhabitants. The presence of their advanced technology would be hidden as ably by the Torvalus technology as it hid its own inventors from detection by countless other races. Their mission would be observation of multiple scientists with the eventual goal of replacing them fully. Names like Edison, Fermi, Tesla, Von Braun, Einstein, and Schrodinger were strange to the Lords, but these would be their targets for the first part of their mission. Instead of killing each subject, as the implications could be dire when their manipulations came to the fore, the assembled Kirishiac Lords decided to become something different for each scientist. Lovers, friends, spouses, and children were to be the preferred method of intrusion into each life. Slowly their ideas began to take form and the world began to change as the sciences of the Kirishiacs became more widely known throughout the world's scientific community.

A/N: It appears that some people have confused when the Kirishiacs began their program of changing Earth's scientists over technology wise (evidently not reading the names of the scientists who received doubles, all prominent in the 19th and 20th Centuries). I have gone back and edited this chapter to make the time difference from when they were imprisoned to when they detected radio signals more noticeable.


	2. Strange Happenings

**A/N: I didn't include this on the first post, but I obviously don't own Babylon 5. This story is simply for my own enjoyment and I hope that you my readers will enjoy it as well.**

**Chapter 1 Strange Happenings  
Sol System  
Sol III (or Earth or Terra)  
Date: early 1900's (~1902)**

The Earth that the Kirishiacs journeyed to looked the same as before, but with several fundamental differences. The advances that lead to the electromagnetic waves (read: radio) that reached out to the world that they'd been imprisoned upon were the joint brainchild of Edison and Tesla. The two scientists working together created the first working radio almost twenty years before Marconi had the same opportunity to build his own model. Their invention, one of many the duo would patent, made the world an even smaller place with the ability to have nearly instantaneous communications. Radio made the transition of what was Mexico into an industrialized part of the United States of North America far quicker than the previous method of carpet baggers had tried. The realm of military technology flourished as President Theodore Roosevelt pushed for more countries in Central America to join as full partners in the new nation that would become the powerhouse of North America. In Europe, the radio allowed the imperialist ambitions of nations like France and Prussia to expand out into Asia and Africa. All due to changes that were wrought prior to the Kirishiacs arriving on Earth.

Military capabilities changed as well with the numerous inventions being patented by Edison and Tesla, so much so that the North American military gained in might to such a degree that several nations in Europe saw them as a possible enemy. Prussia even with their own territorial gains in Asia coveted the North American's recently acquired pacific territories of the Philippines and Guam. When diplomacy failed, the Prussian military was called in to take what they wanted by force. Possessing the largest navy and one of the better equipped armies at the time, the Prussian military was sent in a daring two pronged attack. One attack would be at their objective, Manila, and the other was aimed at the newest state to join the Union, Yucatan. Based on a combined navy/army assault, the Prussian military caught the North American forces by surprise in early January, 1902. Angered by what they saw as a blatant attack on their sovereignty, the North American military swung into action and mobilized a task force consisting of the 1st Cavalry Regiment under the command of Colonel Quanah Parker along with the 1st Pursuit Regiment (the first true instance of the newly invented airplane being used in warfare) under the command of Colonel William Blair. Overall command of the task force was given to General Pancho Villa, himself a former foe of the United States, but returned to command by order of Congress. Aided by Apache scouts, the 1st Cavalry was sent into the Yucatan peninsula campaign with a host of new technologies made possible by Edison and Tesla. Weapons designed and built by Hiram Maxim would also get a good workout during the military campaign in Mexico.

Those advances came when a brother and sister team (the first of the Kirishiacs in disguise) came into the employ of both scientists. Lance and Orolla Sanchez first came to the attention of both Edison and Tesla when one of their papers proposed the presence of exotic particles unknown to science. Having intrigued them with their proposal, both disguised Kirishiacs were recruited to work with the pair. As their work into more esoteric and exotic technologies continued, the Kirishiacs were intrigued by the weapons of warfare that the Earthers had developed in such a short time. Their own militaristic society was mirrored by the ones who they were now working with to advance. In order to further their goals of having a race that could take the war to the Shadows and by extension the other First Ones, the Kirishiacs involved with both Edison and Tesla convinced them of the necessity of providing the North American military with many of the their latest inventions. Smaller and smaller radios were coming into their own and the addition of one of these radios turned the small and primitive aircraft developed by Curtis and the Wright Brothers into an excellent scouting platform. Indeed the 1st Pursuit Regiment was built around a core of Wright Flyers mixed with several Curtis dirigibles. The mixing of advanced technology brought on by the short lived American Civil War lead to other more notable inventions of war machines. Not only were the North American cavalry outfitted with horses, they also had several durable early motorcycles that allowed them to range further than before along with automobiles (already proven by Pershing's early campaign against Mexico) that let the logistical train stay close to the battle lines. The old adage of an "Army marches on its stomach," came back against the ill prepared Prussian Army. Their distance from home along with the lack of logistical support further compounded their eventual loss to the North American Army. All the while, the Kirishiacs worked behind the scenes in their adopted nations to further science slowly. Their end goal was to unify the humans into one nation or grouping of nations to further increase the rate of scientific advancement by pooling their scientific talent together.

The professional Prussian Army was characterized by its initiative, maneuverability, and aggressive command at the operational level of war. They were setup more for a quick decisive victory, rather than an attritional one; far more concerned with tactics and strategy than logistics. This lack of planning for a longer conflict sowed the seeds of their eventual defeat. In a desolate area of what was once Mexico, the Prussian Army struggled against the terrain more so than the local militias in place. Even with cast-off equipment from what used to be the American South (mostly sold second and third-hand); their knowledge of the terrain enabled the militias to hold out long enough for the 1st Cavalry Regiment to arrive. The scouting and irregular abilities of the Apache force assigned to the 1st Cavalry would serve them well in the climate of the Yucatan peninsula. Differing from their native lands, the raiders turned Special Forces, used all of their acumen and skills in the new environment to launch stinging raids against the Prussian Army. With the Prussian Navy having to deal with a late season Hurricane, the few ships sent in by the North American Navy were able to slip by the blockading fleet. Even though Hurricane Walter was churning up the seas around the Yucatan peninsula, the more advanced North American warships, under Commodore James Dewey, were able to put themselves in place to shell an encampment of the Prussian Army. Even though the bombardment was short lived, the psychological impact set the tone for the rest of the war. Raids and lightning attacks by motorcycle-born cavalrymen and the Apache scouts led to a reduced combat capability of the Prussian Army within three days of the start of the harassment campaign. The attacks by the Apaches were even deadlier to the morale of the Prussians; the crack troops led a number of attacks that left sentries dead with only their scalped or horribly mutilated bodies left behind. Even after the raids had ended (less than a week later), the Prussian Army troops were too afraid to walk away from camp at night, even to relieve themselves.

It slowly led to the full involvement of the 22nd Infantry Regiment (Kentucky Rifles), who had been traveling for several days via the new rail lines leading to the lower states. The Kentucky Rifles were well rested, while the remnants of the Prussian Army were bedraggled at best. The lack of sleep and constant harassment proved to be the undoing of the formerly professional force. When the Kentucky Rifles arrived to do battle with the Prussian 5th Regiment, they were but a shell of their former glory. Not wanting to allow an invader any leeway, the commander of the 1st Cavalry and the 22nd Infantry met with the remaining Prussian commanders under a flag of truce. The only option given to the Prussians was their unilateral withdrawal from North American territories. The actions of the North American Navy against the second prong on the Prussian attack on the Philippines had been concluded the day before with a bloody victory over the Prussian Navy and the Army elements. Native tribesmen were given a bounty on any Prussian Army members at large on the numerous islands that make up the Philippines with few if any Prussians surviving in the harsh wilderness. The more veteran fighters most made up of troops who had already fought in the jungles of Asia and Africa would prove to be a thorn in the side of North American troops for several years following the official surrender. These well trained men waged a deadly campaign that came close to breaking the regulars stationed on the tropical island. Wanting the resources available there, the Prussians chose later on to fight a Scorched Earth campaign to deny those same resources. The results caused Manila to burn in the later stages and set the tone of the peace talks held in London (as a neutral nation) following the North American/Prussian War.

**May 1904**

During the peace talks President Theodore Roosevelt would also put forward an idea for a League of Nations as a place for nations to come together to work through their differences in a peaceful nature. A grandiose idea, though flawed by the thinking at the time, it proved to be a step backward for relations with most of Europe. Most of the colonies, however, liked the idea of the League and were eager to join a body where their grievances could be heard. Endorsed by the emergent United States of North America and by the British Empire, the League was mostly filled by the territories and colonies of both nations. The addition of a populist South Africa and Spain added some legitimacy to the League, but without Prussia (itself nursing its wounded pride) or France, the League was doomed to failure. The League's declarations of the rights of people versus the governments also caused many nations to shun them as well; most notably the Romanov led Russia. Trying to maintain their rule, the Romanovs alternated between harsh measures along with more subtle ones; such as building infrastructure and schools. Considering the governing documents of the League to give too much power to their conquered territories; the French, Dutch, and Prussian governments also declined to join the League of Nations. Even though such nations did not join, their people were buoyed to know that there were nations who would stand up for rights sorely lacking in their own nations. Scientists especially chose to join with the signatory League nations in spite of the failure of the governing body. One side effect of the failed League of Nations was the closer ties of the founding nations.

The closer ties resulted in not just pacts of economic benefit, but also scientific endeavors were funded and the Kirishiacs were there to benefit the most from this collective effort. Tesla's lover Orolla "found" an exotic particle in one such experiment that she named the _graviton_. The _graviton_ existed in an artificial state caused by gravity fields. Theories at the time stated that all known particles had been discovered and this new one shocked the scientific community. The exotic particle's properties seem to defy all the "natural laws" of science and came close to ostracizing both Tesla and Sanchez in the international scientific community. It was only the support given to them by the governing agency that funded the project that allowed them to keep their jobs. History would go on to vindicate their discovery.

Other fields of science being researched by the various nations proved to be even more far reaching than just particle physics; metallurgy, chemistry, and rocketry all received big boosts by the massive funding being funneled by the USNA, the UK, and South Africa. Pretty soon a coalition of scientists from several European countries along with their assistants moved wholesale to a laboratory in Canada. Well-funded, but snowed in often, the lab became home to several of the Kirishiacs on Earth (aside from the Kirishiac who was with Von Braun). Their use of the Torvalus stealth devices and a mass reducer of their own design allowed the disguised Kirishiacs to interact with people at "normal (for Earth at least)" sizes instead of their own seven meter height. The research done by them and their human contemporaries encompassed numerous disciplines and laid a good deal of the groundwork for the advances of the 20th Century. Better aircraft and improved mechanics lead to monoplanes and the first primitive tanks, though they would not be to the same quality as the original timeline Earth would have later on in the 20th Century, they still proved to be enormously useful on the battlefield and in civilian roles.

Europe also was undergoing a technological renaissance as they attempted to keep up with the joint laboratory. As alliances were formed and reformed throughout Europe, the rumblings of war came all too soon. The beaten Prussians had managed to unify Germany into a major power and wanted to make up for their failings against the United States of North America. The USNA with its improved relations with much of what remained of Central America and South America was poised to become a massive nation almost encompassing the entirety of the two American continents. Their own alliances with the British Empire, the various colonies of the British, and with South Africa would plunge them into a war without meaning in Europe.

**September 1912 to October 1916**

The resurgent Prussian military, ostensibly in the guise of Germany, led a war of conquest across Europe gobbling up the Low Countries between them and Spain. Joined by a confederation of nearby countries and the Ottoman Empire, the Axis powers were born. After learning of their strategic weakness against the USNA, the lack of depth, the Germany military was prepared to engage in a long campaign. Their fleet quickly took over numerous parts of the Mediterranean and quickly brought the United Kingdom and their allies into the war. Egypt proved to be a difficult target for the Ottomans and became the sole holdout for British forces. Special Forces patterned after the British Gurkhas and the North American Apaches, but composed of those jungle fighters who had experience in the jungles of Africa and Asia and who survived the vengeful Philippine insurgency lead lightning raids into Allied holdings in Spain and France causing a great deal of chaos far and above what the raids actually did in relation to the terror caused. At the forefront of the Axis powers were the myriad of new combat vehicles, the metal monoplane leading the way in the order of battle. New ground vehicles also allowed the combat forces to strike deeply into France and came close to cutting the nation in two as the lead Prussian elements raced to the Atlantic Ocean. The surprise attack coupled with sabotage missions caused the initial alliances to falter as they tried (and failed) to counter the assaults. The initial assaults however ground down as the supply line troops (who were untested at the time) tried to keep up, but quickly lead to delays as fuel supplies dwindled. A few determined counterattacks (most notably in Arabia) and a bulwark (Egypt) lead to some early Allied victories.

The war began heating up as the United States of North America began to mobilize their fleet elements for the treks across the Atlantic. Cargo ships went over at first individually, but many of them did not arrive at English ports. Pretty soon word reached the USNA Navy's command that the Germans were operating a new type of warship that could glide under the water with ease. These undersea boats would prove to be a dangerous part of the voyage to Europe for the many commercial vessels plying their trade. Escorts were quickly put together and several of the new aircraft carriers accompanied the first few convoys. Eventually through much trial and error (more error than anything else), the USNA Navy had developed a way to combat the German U-boat threat.

This early lack of supplies would prove most telling to the Allied side, since most of the early shipping that was lost was made up of essential equipment and food. Food alone proved to be the linchpin as parts of the United Kingdom burned from rioters as they tried to get at strategic reserves of food and other essentials. It may even be likely that Prussian Special Forces were present to incite the riots and to deny those same reserves to the Allies should they make use of England to launch their attacks.

Advanced weapon systems pioneered by the Kirishiac-lead scientists moved to the forefront of the USNA Navy and Army. Lightweight coilguns, using a series of magnets to propel projectiles, proved to be incredibly dangerous to armored ships and tanks used by the Axis powers. The coilguns along with lightweight armor composites and several specialty munitions also caused much havoc among the Axis powers. A massive air campaign was fought by the Allies to take out the industry in Germany that was supporting their war machine, though these raids would be mere pinpricks when compared to later operations.

Dueling Special Forces seemed to be at the fore as the Apaches and Gurkhas began operations against the Prussian troops. Jerusalem itself became a mini battleground as the two opposing Special Forces dueled for control over the city. Eventually the better trained Gurkhas supported by Bedouin scouts routed the Prussian troops from the ancient city. Against the larger Ottoman army arrayed against them, they were able to hold out for over two months before a relief force from South Africa and India helped route the remaining Ottoman troops. The coilgun armed tanks of the South Africans proved to be too much for the Ottoman troops and like the similarly armed tanks of the Prussians, they quickly were forced back by the better technology. Even though it seemed like the Allies were winning through technology, they had just as many setbacks.

The loss of so many aid shipments came close to damaging the economy of the USNA; it was only the assistance of Brazil and Peru that allowed the relatively new nation to recover ground. That aid came because of the presence of the first female Vice President, Simone Bolivar, who showed that the USNA was willing to listen to all members of their nation. The new states and the increased size of the nation called for other changes as the nation went through an unrestrained period of growth and expansion. Racial and economic tensions were barely avoided when Congress passed a law requiring all companies to pay their employees fairly; this was especially a problem in the newer parts of the USNA. It was only the policies of the failed League of Nations, adhered to by the USNA for over ten years, which allowed the country to stabilize following the Great War.

Even though the city of Washington D.C. was entrenched as the political capital of the old USA, the new USNA needed a central location of government. Eventually the city of New Orleans in Louisiana was selected a central enough city. The combination of a thriving port and the central location of both rail lines and the new interstate highway system made it the ideal choice. Trading the malarial swamps for extreme heat (and a bevy of large critters, to quote some politicians), many bureaucrats were not happy by the move, but the will of people was strong in this case. It would be Vice President Bolivar who would travel to Paris to sign off the USNA's part of the Treaty of Versailles that ended the Great War. Following the wishes of the Senate, the USNA lobbied hard against the economic hardships to be imposed on the losing Axis powers, but was overruled by the vengeful French government. Making a personal plea, the USNA was expelled from the proceedings by the French and Spanish delegates for being too soft on their foe. Backed by their allies, South Africa and the British Empire, the USNA declared that they would not follow the provisions set aside in the Treaty of Versailles in regard to the economic sanctions placed on the Axis nations. This olive branch would go far in repairing the relations between the USNA and Prussia following the failed Prussian attack on USNA soil a decade and a half prior to the start of the Great War. The vengeful France and Spain could do little as USNA aid convoys and aircraft over flights delivered much needed food and medical supplies to the now destitute Prussia (Germany itself dissolved by the Treaty of Versailles) and their allies.

A/N: Before anyone beats me up about how Mexico is not part of the US; that is true, but remember this is an AU. Benito Juarez (wiki him) was President of Mexico right before the French occupation of Mexico starting in 1861 (during the American Civil War), his election legal due to the 1857 constitution. His thoughts on annexation were more for the support of the veteran US Army (survivors of the American Civil War and a number of Confederate troops to fall back on as well) against the French military supporting Emperor Maximilian I. Even with a victory in 1862 (Battle of Puebla and the basis for Cinco de Mayo), Juarez needed help. He already had good relations with the US and offered that the US could annex Mexico in exchange for military aid. This aid also later included monetary support and other means to get the country rebuilt following the French expulsion from Mexico. Since Mexico already had a state structure, they were easily added to the US's state structure. Using the Monroe Doctrine as the rationale, the newly formed USNA managed to push out all of the Imperial powers in North America and came to unify the Continent just prior to the First World War. Regarding Diaz (think of him as my beta put it: he's the Grant to Juarez's Lincoln), he was a popular leader following Diaz even though his rule over Mexico was more of a dictatorship. Hopefully this answers anyone's questions about how history was changed and if you have any others, please feel free to send me a message on here.


	3. And on again

**AN: Thank you to everyone who has commented on or just for the likes/favorites for this story. I have tried to add in some page breaks (hopefully fanfic will let them stay) to break up different sections for a bit more readability.**

Chapter 2 And on again…

**Sol III  
April 1938**

_WAR! Headlines across Europe scream out this refrain. We all had hoped not to see the same here in the United States of North America, but the plight of our German allies call out to us. Hemmed in on both sides by angry nations poised to bring war to the masses, the Germans need our help America. It is only through our might of arms that we will be able to avert this disaster. Take up your arms for Lady Liberty! Bring forth the peal of Liberty from the mighty bells America. This we do in the name of freedom. Let slip the dogs of war and cry HAVOC!_

Chicago Tribune, Editor-in-Chief, April 1938

***-EH-***

_We need allies in this unprecedented war against us. Not fit to trust in their own damnable Treaty, the French and their lapdogs have seen fit to make war upon us all. We will need assistance as we are assailed on all sides. Our political leadership narrowly survived the unrest when the Nazis were executed for fermenting rebellion against our elected leadership. The Kaiser needs our support. Russia, those flea-bitten curs, oh you do not deserve what you have taken. You ally with the French and Spanish against us… yet it is not enough for you to take our land and what little remains of our dignity. We all look to the Americas for their support. They supported us with bread and the necessities of life when the others chose to ignore us. Even the South Africans have sent aid convoys along with the Americans and British. Have we truly fallen so far? I say to you all: Men of Germany, take up arms, and take the fight to the _Entente._ Our sacred duty to our nation of birth calls out to you. Avenge our children and our forlorn mothers._

Bavarian Daily Post, translated from German, April 1938

***-EH-***

The allied League of Nations; consisting of the USNA, South Africa, and the British Empire (plus the various holdings and territories of the superpowers) found themselves brought back into a war of aggression that would threaten their way of life. Each of the signatory nations to the League, even though it failed to take root elsewhere, chose to ignore the Treaty of Versailles and continued to trade and supply the fallen German nation. Even fractured and separated from the rest of the world, the League tried (and failed in some cases) to stem the tide of nationalism that came from the rampant expansion post war in each of the member nations. Faced with watching a nation starving to death slowly and debased for the cruel pleasures of those who thought of themselves as the wronged, the League chose to support the former Prussia and their allied countries. The support came from massive ships sent to supply food and medicines (and protected by the dangerous warships of the USNA and British Navies) along with air support by large cargo planes that carried the needed supplies deep into Germany far from any coasts. Unable to stop the League, most of Europe chose to wait them out. The advanced technology edge of the League would prove almost insurmountable at first. As with every human situation, greed and avarice began to take root. A bribed scientist left the Canadian laboratory, where the Kirishiacs worked in secret along with the League's best scientists, taking with him the plans for the latest piece of advanced technology to the Entente nations of Europe. Consisting of France, Spain, and Russia the Triple Entente nations were formed out of a mutual animosity for Germany. Joined later by Japan when the war erupted in February of 1938, the Entente nations were poised to send the world into another war.

The stolen League technology was in the form of a revolutionary mass reducer. Produced by the Kirishiacs and based on the graviton research, the mass reducer allows the user to reduce the mass of an object. By reducing the mass of an object, it lowers the weight of the object; this is due to the mass of the object interacting with the gravity field of Earth. The reduced mass means that metals can be modified to provide more strength for a myriad of industrial (and military) uses without increasing the weight of the object in question. Fortunately for the League, the rogue scientist did not take their revolutionary mass concentrator or have access to research into antigravity techniques.

The mass concentrator utilizes gravitons to "modify" the makeup of materials; various metals can then be reduced in mass and combined into a new material that has the properties of the combined materials, but without the added weight. The mass concentrator could also create super dense materials using the same principles, something that would be used to good effect by the League's military. The structures at the Canadian outpost in Saskatchewan were the first location to make use of the new _mithral_ and _adamantine_ metals. Named after mythical materials, _mithral_ is a combination of aluminum and iron that makes a very light weight metal and _adamantine_ is a blending of iron, titanium, and tungsten into a super hard metal. The light weight _mithral_ allows for extra equipment to be used due to the high tensile strength of the metal and has been used heavily in the construction of new war equipment. _Adamantine_ as well is used in the latest League war equipment and the super dense metal has proved to be almost damage resistant against all but the heaviest blows (ideal for armored vehicles).

League scientists throughout the 1920's and the early 1930's were hard at work on unlocking the secrets laid bare by the graviton. Their research led to the development of the first true antigravity platform. Little more than a two meter circular platform, it would revolutionize the development of armored vehicles for the League. The fearsome reputation of the 21st and 23rd South African Armored Divisions was heightened when the troops were brought to the deserts of Tijuana for war games in 1925. They faced off against the 3rd and 4th Armored Divisions of the USNA.

Even with a fearsome reputation, the South African tank corps was no match for the new _Villa_ and _Lee_ tanks of the USNA Army. Making full use of the new mass reducer and the new metals, the USNA Army's tanks had heavier armor and were faster. The decision by the League authorities who witnessed the match-up, to push out the plans for the new USNA designs to each of the nations in the League would prove to be a death knell for "traditional" armored tactics learned by the Entente nations. On the horizon for the League was an even bigger surprise for the Entente in the form of true antigravity powered tanks and aircraft.

***-EH-***

**June 13, 1940**

_June 13__th__ a day that will live in infamy. The dastardly Military Forces of the Empire of Japan in an unprovoked surprise attack, with the full support of their allies in the Entente have invaded our sovereign territory of Hawaii with a fleet supported by Tsarist Russian Ground Forces. This act of unbridled aggression will not go unpunished. By order of Congress, the United States of North America now unanimously declares A State of War to exist between us and the Four Entente Nations. May God have mercy on their souls for we shall not be so kind._

Address by President Porfirio Diaz of the USNA

***-EH-***

Japanese forces supported by Russian ground forces chose to invade the USNA's main port of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii on June 13, 1940. This act of war would lead to the intervention of the League into the war that was already raging in Europe and Asia. Simultaneous attacks on the Philippines, Australia, and Guam by the Entente were repulsed with heavy casualties on both sides.

It was the ground occupation of the Hawaiian Islands that would set the tone for the entire war. The intent of the Entente and their allies was to force China out of the war (with most of the nation going to both Russia and Japan) and to cause a split within the British Empire's holdings in the South Pacific and in Asia. The attack on Hawaii opened up another front in the conflict and pulled the League into the war far sooner than the Entente had hoped. The conflict over China and Burma was a long drawn out affair with League Special Forces doing most of the fighting. The Chindits, notably the 77th Indian Infantry Brigade and the 3rd Indian Infantry Division, came into their own with support from the USNA's high altitude cargo aircraft.

These cargo aircraft, made possible with antigravity, were able to carry tons of supplies to the troops and to support their attacks with the attack variants. The introduction of a man-portable coil rifle proved to be one of the best innovations of the war. The lightweight rifle could hurl a projectile the size of a grain of rice with enough velocity to penetrate the light weight armor used by the Russian ground forces. Against the lightly armored Japanese troops, the League's coil rifles were highly successful.

USNA forces mobilized quickly, shifting large numbers of men and equipment using their antigravity craft, a lesson learned after dealing with German U-boats during the First World War. The mainline ships at Pearl Harbor were some of the oldest ships still in active use and their loss, while a major blow to morale, were not mourned by the admiralty. With the full support of Congress, factories across the USNA began producing large numbers of heavy weapons and equipment to be shipped to divisions across the world.

Under the command of General Dwight Eisenhower, the League had an experienced officer corps (due to a number of low intensity conflicts from previous administrations), but were still unfamiliar with a number of the latest tank and aircraft designs. The newly built _Sherman_ antigravity tank and the latest incarnations of the venerable _Lee_ and _Villa_ (heavy and light respectively) tanks proved popular with the line regiments and the second line forces as well. The extra training that anti-gravity required created a lack of trained pilots and ground crew that wouldn't be remedied until the mid-point of the war, around 1942. The hyper advanced _Flying Fortress_ antigravity aircraft was also used heavily at first. Built as more of a gunship, the need for a strategic bomber really never caught on with the USNA. The highly accurate heavy coilguns mounted on the _Flying Fortress_ and the remote turrets for anti-fighter defense allowed the big aircraft to cruise at altitudes far higher than ever imagined.

The theft of the mass reducer to the Entente nations created a miniature arms race against the League. The League already had mastered the new technology and had moved on to other pursuits, which the Entente would find out later to be antigravity, while the Entente was beset with conflicting design reviews. The work of the former German scientist Wernher von Braun, spirited away along with his "son" following the Treaty of Versailles, with the mass reducer produced the deadly intercontinental missile system. Reducing the mass of the rocket allowed the scientific teams to increase the range of the weapon and to make it easier to produce with heavier materials (which were reduced in mass by the new technology).

These early rockets were extremely heavy and most failed to launch at first or flew for very short distances due to the mass of the materials used in their construction. The mass reducer allowed the Entente scientists to continue to use the heavy materials, but with their mass reduced the rockets flew much further. The opening shots of the war came when French rocket sites began launching against German targets. While the rockets did little actual damage to German infrastructure, the terror of this new weapon system caused German morale to plummet. Too new and too fragile for use aboard naval vessels, the new rocket systems would remain a land based armament for the duration of the war. With eventual improvements, the rockets slowly gained better warheads (themselves the product of the mass reducer concept) and better guidance systems. A launch in late December 1943 showed how deadly the missile system was when a pair of rockets came close to hitting New York City.

***-EH-***

_Invasion feared! All citizens are hereby ordered to prepare emergency shelters and to form volunteer detachments in case of invasion. The threat of the Entente spoiling our pristine beaches and coastal communities is too great of a risk._

Information video broadcast to heighten civilian awareness

***-EH-***

The chance of invasion from the coasts proved to be of an inflammatory nature in the USNA's press. With long stretches of coastline on both sides of the massive nation, they were for the most part unguarded, aside from antiquated fortifications built for previous wars. The threat from U-boats operated by the Entente powers forced Congress to approve the construction of coastal defenses not unlike those built prior to the American Civil War. These new forts were primarily built along choke points and natural areas. The American controlled isle of Cuba and other Caribbean territories quickly became fortified nations with heavy forts built along the coasts. The Yucatan and the new Panama Canal also were heavily defended in case of attack. In the case of the unprotected Canal Zone, artificial islands were created to hold fortresses away from the entrances that could delay enemy shipping. While they were never tested under fire, the presence of such heavy coastal defenses increased the morale of the American public. The introduction of so many heavy projects also greatly benefitted the economies of those areas that received such large fortresses. In later years, the fortresses and battlements would become popular tourist attractions.

***-EH-***

**August 1942**

Matters came to a head as Germany came close to collapse in the late summer of 1942. It was only supplies airlifted in by League powers and the relentless antigravity naval attacks that held off the Entente powers. Germany's salvation almost came too late, especially when a particularly brutal battle on the border with Switzerland saw both sides destroyed by a terror rocket dropping into the midst of the combatants. The increasing accuracy of Entente rockets were becoming a hazard for the antigravity aircraft and naval vessels of the League as several came close to destruction at the hands of the Entente.

August 1942 saw the first of several attempted landings by the League. Instead of attacking the coast lines of the Entente, the League staged near orbital drops from high altitude _Flying Fortresses _and_ Super Fortresses_. The increasingly accurate fire from Entente rocket sites made these insertions even more dangerous, but the League was able to land several Special Forces teams in both Spain and France. Their mission objective was to silence the launch sites of the Entente's rocket forces and to capture/eliminate any of the scientists and engineers working there.

As an added incentive for the Apache troops, they were given carte blanche to carry out their mission; mostly due to the revered status the troops held during the Prussian attack on the Yucatan at the turn of the century. Very quickly it became dangerous for Entente soldiers to be nearby rocket bases and after Von Braun was spirited away along with his family, the Entente enacted a stricter security scheme for all of their bases. Von Braun's son, a disguised Kirishiac, went on to join the research complex in Saskatchewan (after all of the appropriate security clearances due to the risk of spies) and contributed to the war effort greatly.

An attack near Christmas in 1942 was the most successful of all raids. A South African combined combat command, mixing antigravity vehicles with "regular" tanks and infantry, created a salient near the southern Russian city of Saint Petersburg. They managed to catch a Russian battle fleet in place and the resulting battle laid waste to much of the docks and naval yards in Saint Petersburg. British Expeditionary forces followed the South African troops into the salient and forced battle against the Russians near the German border with Poland.

The combination of the higher technology League troops with the beleaguered German soldiers quickly forced the Russians back to their original border. Far ranging attacks by USNA high and sub-orbital antigravity craft forced the Russians to the negotiating table and for them; at least, the war was over. As part of the armistice with them all territory taken by Russia from the Low Countries, Poland, and Germany would be turned over immediately and reparations would be paid to an escrow fund held in trust by the USNA for rebuilding following the war. Germany wanted greater restrictions, but the diplomatic corps of the League reminded them that they had been in the same situation following the last World War.

With the loss of Russia to backstop any American attacks, Japan found itself out maneuvered quickly in the brutal island hopping campaign being waged against them. With no targets for their submersibles and U-boats, they could not wage an attrition war against the USNA Navy or the Merchant Marine. Their warships were also at a disadvantage as new advances, thanks to the capture and repatriation of Von Braun to the USNA and the technologies developed thanks to him began to appear in the USNA ranks. Long range missiles (with more sophisticated targeting systems than the cruder rockets employed by the Entente) carried by the various antigravity craft, small enough to be carried by them and not needing the massive launch gantries of their Entente counterparts, quickly over took the massed coilgun armament.

Several of the massive _Super Fortress_ antigravity craft were modified to mount the largest coilguns yet in League service; these new cannons had far greater range and as a result the USNA antigravity craft could stay aloft far higher than the Japanese guns and aircraft could reach. The total destruction of Tokyo and Nagasaki by a single _Super Fortress_ armed with these new coilguns nearly spelled the end of the Japanese military campaign. The USNA had been preparing for a massive ground invasion, but the surrender of the Japanese military after Hiroshima and Osaka had also been destroyed from the air by a single antigravity craft came about in May 1943.

With only France and Spain still holding on, out of the Entente nations, the noose began to grow slowly around both countries. Literally starved, as all shipping was eradicated by the League's Navy, the two nations were becoming desperate. In an attempt to break out from their dwindling areas of control, two divisions under the command of Charles de Gaulle (formed of the few armored units, so espoused by de Gaulle) drove relentlessly through the League's line of advance.

Attacking much like Scipio Africanus against Hannibal, de Gaulle's lead armored regiments supported by infantry caused a bulge to form in the League's advance. Hoping to stall for time and for a more advantageous position at any future peace talks, de Gaulle's colonels were expected to lead their groups to victory. Unfortunately for de Gaulle, he was forced to take on Philippe Petain due to political reasons. The aging Petain was looking for some glory before he died and this would prove to be the undoing of de Gaulle's offensive. Unused to commanding armor in combat, Petain chose to use it to simply carry his infantry to each battlefield. Poor placement of the armor along with a limitation to the back field further made his advance bog down. At the best of the attempt by de Gaulle's two divisions, they managed to force their way back to the original border with Germany, but they were soon cutoff as USNA antigravity craft circled behind them. Forced to surrender, Petain never did gain his glory.

***-EH-***

**January 1943**

Beset with loses, the majority of the Entente powers chose to come to the bargaining table (the exception being Japan who lasted until May). At first the Entente powers were belligerent to the League nations, but with their obvious complicity in the previous Treaty of Versailles and the horrendous conditions wrought on Germany the Entente was forced to negotiate. The key component of the negotiations was the conditions by which their citizens were forced to live in.

The League, long a supporter of self-rule (something that even the British were forced to admit to), put in a provision that the Entente nations would have to give all of their people (regardless of race, ethnicity, or religion) the right to self-determination; meaning that any colony or member of an Empire had the right to self-rule if they had the ability to provide for at least 60% of the resources needed by the people. Any nation that did not give their people that right would have their government replaced by a committee of the people of that nation supported by the League.

One additional stipulation would bring about increased trade among each nation. On July 23, 1943 the Entente nations of France, Spain, Russia, and Japan would sign the treaty that brought an end to the Second World War. The peace gained was hard won by the League nations, especially as the core nations also had to abide by the provisions of the treaty (most notably the British Empire having to give up many of their holdings). The increased economic ties between the various nations on Earth were further cemented when the League worked together to rebuild Europe and Asia into a stronger whole than it was before.

The emergence of China as two distinct nations was also a major turning point (it almost became three, but the people of Taiwan were persuaded to remain part of the mainland). The former ideals of the League of Nations was recreated into a single body that took the name, United Nations of Earth, to symbolize the goal to unite all of Earth together for more than political reasons. At first the UNE was planned as an economic body and later became a scientific body.

The only article of any true contention was where to locate the central headquarters of the organization. Each nation on Earth wanted it to be located within their territory, if only for the prestige. In the end, the small island nation of Bermuda gained the key majority needed. Using technology gained from the USNA, the small island nation created more land by using antigravity technology to raise the sea bed into place. The new parts of the island were then reinforced with the same bonding techniques used to create the armor used by the League's deadly antigravity tanks and aircraft.


	4. Interludes

**AN: Due to some language further into the chapter, I am bumping up the rating to Teen. No real violence, but language will be found in later chapters.**

**Chapter 3 Interludes**

Excerpt from _Popular Mechanics_ July 1954

_In less than a decade, it truly is amazing how much technology has changed. Everyone has seen the archival footage of _Super Fortresses_ and _Flying Fortresses_ flying over both Japan and parts of Europe using the newly developed antigravity systems, but the wave of the future really is here with space opening up to commercial and government launch concerns. The work of the _Entente_ during the Second World War with their rocketry designs is what led to this opening of the heavens. The launch of _Space Station Liberty_, with a slated completion date of 1956, is but one step into exploring the reaches of space. The new UNE, or United Nations of Earth, has been pushing for more developments of technology to tap into the untold mineral wealth present in our solar system. Citing concerns about the depletion of resources on Earth, the ventures into space have been met with some criticism from environmental groups, but others are fully onboard with the idea._

_The integration of world governments into a cohesive body has further improved communication between scientists. The development of an interconnected communications medium between scientific facilities has blossomed into what we call the Data Network today. This revolutionary tool has been made possible by the development of crystal computing. Using specially designed and grown crystals, this new type of storage medium has truly taken off when quantum computing was first introduced following WWII. Based in no small part on advances in fire control systems on warships and antigravity craft, the quantum computing revolution has become a worldwide phenomenon. Each new innovation in computing and advances with the Data Network has made an already smaller world seem even smaller as instantaneous communications is possible between two points far removed from each other. Even those pioneering astronauts on _Liberty_ are able to discuss their scientific achievements with scientists on the Earth, even when the station is on the other side of the globe. This profound change in communications ability has furthered the spread of technology even further._

_It is unique to think of what the future may hold even more so as more innovations are created. There is already talk of using _Liberty_ as a stepping stone to the Moon or even beyond into our solar system via both manned and unmanned spacecraft. The future indeed is in our grasp._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from the _Chicago Tribune_ December 1958

_The fateful words of President Josephine Delacruz that the USNA would land a team of astronauts on the Moon came to fruition as a team of four astronauts exited from their spacecraft, _Eagle 1,_ onto the surface of the Moon. Landing at the _Sea of Tranquility_, the team of astronauts planted a flag commemorating their achievement and there was a ceremonial ground breaking as well where the future site of _Luna Base_ would be built. As soon as the USNA crew began to leave the site, other craft began landing on the surface of the Moon ferrying down supplies for the first settlement on our closest neighbor in space. This achievement was made possible by the now massive space station _Liberty_ and the bevy of scientists held within the bulk of the station. Using a Von Braun inspired station design, _Liberty_ and later the _Freedom_, both became the stop off points for any manned space flight. The beginnings of the new _Luna Base_ are a fine achievement for further endeavors into space and further into our very own solar system._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _Politics Today: An Online Journal_ January 1969

_It is more than unique how the world has changed in light of numerous scientific enterprises. While science moves forward, the oppression of indigenous tribes continue in many of the non-UNE countries and continues to be a political hot topic. While so many people are riveted to their television sets watching the Moon landings and the continued construction of _Luna Base_, there are still many people who are starving in the world today. The lead of the military class has caused many to wonder if the UNE is really a precursor to a militaristic state run by those in charge and leaving aside the grandiose principals espoused for so long by the original League nations. Political parties are falling to the wayside as people are looking beyond the matters of what happens on Earth. The addition of the Net [sic: Data Network] to the lives of countless people has resulted in a narrowing of political and socioeconomic focus as everyone is able to find out information about cities and others half way around the world like never before. When you factor in the ease of travel through cities that are a part of the UNE, it adds into even more of a blurred line when it comes to political factions._

_The factions coalesced into a set of four parties rather than the "traditional" two of the North American, though now the American, government. The addition of political parties from the former British Empire along with the parties once part of the South African government has caused the formation of new political parties; all of which have begun to change the political landscape of the UNE. Instead of being labeled as Democrat or Republican, the new parties that have emerged have been instead labeled as the Hawks, Doves, Social Democrats, and the Conservatives. Mocking aside, the new political parties are instead an extension of what was once believed by many within the various states of the UNE. Even the often derided Dove party has gained some momentum due to the lack of full scale wars, which has led to a smaller coalition for the Hawk party. The troubles in the formerly Imperial Russia came close to destroying the political ambitions of the Dove party, but the passing of the Romanovs into obscurity and poverty has averted another possible war. Even the splitting of China from almost twenty five years previously has led to two very stable democracies with many of the smaller Asian countries following suit. The willingness of the Social Democrats to push for broad changes to the infrastructure of the defeated peoples in both Europe and Asia has led to the formation of stronger allies as they are changed from within by the aid shipments and rebuilding still ongoing in some parts of their countries._

_The semi-dissolution of national boundaries in favor of the larger whole has led many to wonder if this just some overarching plan by a shadowy cartel of individuals or if this is the natural evolution of politics due to the ever smaller world we live inhabit._

***-EH-***

_Jane's Defense Weekly July 1971_

_The development of aircraft has gone through a number of changes throughout the past seven decades. Going from a frail biplane to a graceful monoplane in just twenty years, the aircraft has experienced numerous design changes though the basic design remained as it had been for Curtis and the Wright Brothers. Going into the Second World War, the wide scale use of antigravity technology further changed the aircraft even more. Gone were the fast fleeting shapes flitting about in combat, in their place large dirigible-like craft used first by the USNA became the main weapons of warfare. These large ships named _Super Fortress _and _Flying Fortress_ epitomizes the emphasis on antigravity technology to create large weapon platforms that remained too high flying for conventional propeller or even jet propelled aircraft to reach. The massive coilgun batteries carried by these new age airships proved to be devastatingly effective against every single target they faced. As we approach the latter half of the 20__th__ Century, the coilgun air ships of old have changed even more with the introduction of the new _Typhoon_ heavy antigravity ship._

_The _Typhoon_ combines features of the old Fortress line up with the actual naval vessels that were used to good effect by the once surface navies of the USNA and the UK. The threat of U-boats caused the League's navies to switch to an all antigravity propulsion method for their shipping and the awe inspiring sight of the USNA's and UK's massive Battleships/Dreadnoughts moving above the waves and above the ground was usually the last thing seen by many opponents. With the rocket age upon us, the introduction of more powerful engines have led away from the conventionally powered dirigibles and former naval craft into a more robust antigravity craft built around these new engines. The _Typhoon_ is powered by a revolutionary powerplant that remains a secret as of this printing. The new powerplant provides more than enough energy to propel the massive 100 meter frame to speeds approaching Mach 3. The aerodynamically designed frame and outer surfaces are indicative of new thinking from scientists across the globe. It has already been announced that Boeing/BAE are planning on developing a civilian model that uses the same frame, but without the prodigious armament._

_It is only here that you will find out the power behind the guns on the _Typhoon_. Jane's was granted the unprecedented honor of viewing a test firing of the antigravity craft's main armament at the Nepalese test range. Long range coilguns have been scaled up and with the new powerplant delivering more power, they have almost double the range of their WWII forbearers, yet mass less than before. The reduced mass came thanks to the almost half century old mass reducer technology that has made the League's military forces so dangerous for most of this century. Combining the ranged firepower of the coilguns, the secondary armament of both long and short range missiles cover any range issues that may occur on the battlefield. With so many heavy cannons, the _Typhoon_ has one other feature that is surprising, the antigravity craft has enough power to leave the bonds of Earth. While this was not shown to Jane's, it has been mentioned in several trade publications as the future of warfare. Will all of those campy science fiction shows that have popped up on television come true? It certainly looks that way if the ship designers of the UNE have any say in the matter._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from an Internal UNE document circa 1970 made available due to Public Information Act 2042

… _[sic: were] discussing the research potential for new energy sources and trying to come up with additional ideas for advanced power generation schemes. The power hungry coilguns and the new particle cannons were especially needy in regard to power generation and our current internal combustion sources are too limited or in this case going to be too large to support the power requirements. We need a new energy source and one that is very abundant on Earth that won't become a possible energy monopoly. One of the researchers came up with a strange idea to use the mass concentrator in a novel approach; instead of concentrating two or more materials together, they would instead use the mass concentrator to compress a single material. They wanted to see if it was possible to compress gases into a solid rather than using the esoteric method of lowering the gases' temperature first. The experiment was all setup and they decided to use a Noble gas since they were already inert and would be, presumed at that, to be safer for all concerned. Using a gravitic field produced by several arranged coilgun assemblies and a mass concentrator, the researchers pumped into several liters of Helium gas into the field. Immediately the field began to take form as more and more power was pumped into the system. Slowly the Helium gas began to form into first a roughly shaped sphere, but as more power was added, the sphere became more defined. It was at this point that the sphere had shrunk in size to about the size of volleyball and began to take on a unique blue hue._

_One of the researchers in what was considered to be an incredibly stupid thing to do reached out and touched their ungloved hand to the sphere of Helium. "It's solid, completely solid and doesn't feel cold at all" was all he exclaimed while he manipulated the sphere around in the gravitic field. That was the first part of the experiment. Later tests began to use other more explosive gases like Hydrogen and Oxygen. Both produced the same sphere effect, but the amount of power needed for Oxygen reduced the need for such a material. In another stroke of brilliance, the same researcher who had theorized about the use of the mass reducer/concentrator came up with an idea to use a gravitic field in conjunction with the mass concentrator to increase the mass of the gas sphere inside to see if it would combust. The gravitic field should be able to hold in the combustion of the gas particles, 'should be' being the key phrase here. In a heavily shielded room, another sphere of Hydrogen was made with five liters of it already in liquid form. The sphere formed far faster in this instance. Once the sphere was fully formed, power was increased to the new mass concentrator assembly(horrible name indeed), and slowly the sphere began to smoke. It reached a point just past equilibrium when the sphere suddenly combusted in an eerie bluish-green flame held in by the strong gravitics. Manipulating a control, one of the technicians began to move the combusted Hydrogen around in an infinity loop. Instruments were brought out and electricity was actually measured around this infinity loop! Not only that, but Helium gas was being expelled from the center of combusting gas source and it being a non-flammable gas made it an ideal product of the combustion. We had discovered a method of create the sun's power in a laboratory. This heady experiment brought about an untold amount of joy and excitement for the future for mankind. We had a possible energy source that was self-sustaining and created Helium gas as a byproduct of the combustion process. _

_The first problems that came up for the powerplant team was that they needed a source of power for the initial combustion to start. Once the combustion started, it proved to be self-sustaining _[_Editor's note: the first reaction continued to work for close to a decade before the reaction burned itself out_]_, but getting to that point proved to be difficult. It was finally decided that the new powerplant would need to be a two-stage design. Stage one would be a small liquid fueled powerplant that would provide the initial electrical charge to power the gravitic generators and the mass concentrator assembly of the second stage. Later research showed that a fuel cell system could replace the liquid fueled powerplant. The second stage was a solid sphere of Hydrogen, massing close to a half ton but reduced in size to only a few kilos, that would be ignited by the gravitic fields put around it. The gravitic controllers would then bring the combusting hydrogen around into an infinity loop held in place by the powerful gravitic fields. By moving the infinity loop through a magnetic field (also produced by a properly calibrated gravitic controller), electricity could be generated by using the principles of _Magnetohydrodynamics_ (MHD) using the plasma of the infinity loop within the reactor housing. _

_Referred to by many as the start of sustainable fusion, the system has great potential for use on a number of designs and future designs. A raffle among the lab technicians was used to determine the name of the new powerplant and by a stunning majority it was determined that the new powerplant would be called an_ Energy Captor System._ While the name lacks in some qualities, the name quickly caught on once it was released to the public.__ This new development was approved for combat use and is featured on the new _Typhoon_ combat craft. Other applications are forthcoming…_

***-EH-***

Excerpt from Sandhurst Combat Academy's _Modern Politics & Their Effect on the World and Military Operations_ lecture taught by Brigadier Desmond Montgomery December 2, 1985

"_Settle down now class. Yes, even you two nitwits in the back row there. This is important enough for all of you to know. Warfare isn't just about using tanks and other weapons to smash apart a foe; there is more to it and you will all have to deal with that as officers. George Santayana is often quoted 'Those who forget the past are forever doomed to repeat it,' that is all too true for those who choose not to study for their exams or to show up on time Cadet Peterson. Sit down quickly and get your materials out. That will be one demerit for you young man. Make it a point to show up early and follow what your Drill Instructors have told you often enough: 'If you're early, you're on time; if you're on time, you're late; and if you're late, you're screwed' or something else more colorful knowing some of the DI's as I do. Come now, where were we? Ah yes, we were just about to discuss the role politics has on combat operations and how changing politics have really changed our world following the Second World War._

"_Combat has too often been romanticized, don't look at me like that ladies and gentlemen; all of you have been brought up on the old sanitized war footage that's been passed around on the History Channel all too often. War is far more than seeing an enemy through your targeting scopes on an antigravity craft or through the camera lens. War is brutal and awful, but for too long it has been another tool of the diplomats for when their negotiations have failed. It has remained an ever present threat to our world, but I do not bemoan it. Not at all, war has shaped my life as a young man during the final stages of World War Two. I lived through some pretty nasty firefights and survived. I was there when Germany came close to starting a Third World War when they decided to avenge themselves on the Russians and French for the _Entente's_ poor practices during the war. They were brought back to a negotiating table by the force of arms and the fact that they would be the aggressor once more… You see it now my students? I see from the blank look of incomprehension that some of you don't know how to tie your own boots without written instructions. Yes, you there in the middle. Indeed, you are correct that they had forgotten their past actions or they chose to ignore them. That too becomes a problem when your political leadership chooses to ignore the past or they are blinded by their ideals._

"_This brings me to my next point: what does politics have to do with my lecture? I'll tell you all why it has such meaning. When the League of Nations was first proposed by Theodore Roosevelt, he was laughed at by most of the nations… yes, yes except for a few. I do see that some of you have done your reading assignment as directed. This initial interest in the League became a catalyst for further scientific endeavors and lead to the alliances that fought against the ascendant Germany. Then that alliance was shattered as the European nations chose to enact the _Treaty of Versailles_ that forced through horrible reparations against the now dissolved German state. The League stepped up here and changed all of that with humanitarian aid. This aid was the catalyst that brought the German states into the League's alliance during the Second World War. Those same catalysts also lead to the resurgent German state to almost declare war to right 'wrongs' that they had suffered previously from those same European nations. They forgot why they were the pariahs of Europe for so long. It was only after the League had to intervene that they began to change their outlook on their situation._

"_At this point I would like to point out that all of my lecture and most of your reading assignments are going to be on the final exam to be held at the end of this term in three days. So take the time to read through the assignments again and actually listen to the lectures instead of the crap that passes for music today._

"_Let's see here… yes indeed the next point to make: what does politics have to do with our individual nations that are signatories of the United Nations of Earth pact? Politics has dictated too often how a person should think and what they should believe in to be the truth. Whether it is the rhetoric that another political party is wrong with their ideas and ideals or if it relates to some philosophical difference that cannot be fathomed by anyone else, it usually results in hurt feelings and the urge to right some perceived wrongs. This leads to further divisions as each of those associated with a political party or agenda then tries to get more people to join with them. Then the political parties begin to suffer from divisions as though on opposing viewpoints within each party strive to form bonds with others who think and feel like them. This further leads to more political parties forming that have miniscule ideas and ideals that govern them until you reach a critical mass. At this point you have so many choices they start to sound like each other and then people start to decide that sense they sound so much alike, 'Why not just form them back together? We all think the same way, therefore we should be together.' Of course then you are left with a political system that has only a few parties left behind as the larger parties gobble up the smaller ones and the smaller ones combine to defend themselves from the larger parties. Then the cycle starts all over again."_

"_Brigadier Montgomery, why are you talking about all of this nonsense? I thought that we would be introduced the political parties at the various points in history rather than this approach that you're taking."_

"_Excellent question young man, you hit it on the head as to why you need some background and that much of it really is nonsense. However politics can never really, truly be defined to where it can make sense to everyone out there. The biggest issue with politics as it is currently viewed and this is only with the appreciation of our hindsight being 20/20 or better is that you have to understand the Cult of Personality. In addition to the Cult of Personality, there are also the effects of the so-called pop culture. Stop snickering, I see each of you and your names have already been entered for additional PT. I'm not so old, that I don't recognize the effect that modern music and television has on all of you. It was the same way when I was your age after WWII. I had to deal with the same influences and I hope that all of you do recognize that you are being influenced by what you watch, read, or listen to and those sources all change how you think and how you tend to perceive the world around you. You are here at Sandhurst because you all were recommended to be here for additional training. That's why you're cadets here rather than the ranks that you previously held. When, or if for some of you, leave here you will all be officers serving in a variety of posts. As you move higher up through the ranks of your militaries or even if you're part of the Unified Military Corps, you will need to understand the external influences being used against you and the troops under your command, the good Lord help us all should some of you survive to command rank. Knowing when to attack and when to pull back is part of some of your classes, but knowing the why is what I'm trying to teach to each of you. For your next assignment, I want you all to read through the treatise written by Milovan Dilas about how Communism cannot work. While it never found a publisher in the wake of the bombings in the former Low Countries, there was a very concerted effort by several Marxists to push through their agenda retitled as Communism._

"_Let that also be another reminder to all of you about politics. Be very careful when a new ideology surfaces, especially when penned by members of the previous affiliation. Too often it is the original work repurposed for another generation with flowery words or phrases to confuse and to tempt young radicals. Those same radicals tend to be the biggest problems for many countries as they're usually the first to push for change when they tend to know very little as to why there has to be change. Be vigilant always young ones and I will see you tomorrow for the continuation of this lecture. Be sure to read the notes, for I will not be as lenient during the next class period if you have not studied. Be prepared for a possible pop quiz or even a full one offensive. Good day to you all, you are dismissed from class."_

***-EH-***

_Chicago Tribune_, dated July 31, 1996

_Off to Mars!_

_With those words, the intrepid crew of the spacecraft _Beagle II_ sped off to the Red Planet. Long considered as a viable planet for exploration and as fodder for the many B movies that came out of Hollywood not long after the start of the space program, Mars has held mankind's fascination for as long as Man has noticed that one of the stars was a distinctive red color. The valiant international crew of nine astronauts, from all of the industrialized nations that make up the United Nations of Earth, are a cross section of lives touched by the space industry. Each of these pioneering individuals is truly the best that the great nations of Earth have to offer in their various fields of study. The lengthy journey from Earth to Mars will take them and their spacecraft over three months to transit the vast distances. The new power sources developed for the journey are just now making a discernible impact here on Earth as the world's energy needs are being met without using any of the costly and damaging fossil fuels._

_These brave astronauts will be but one of the first expeditions to reach this part of our solar system. Later this year, the main Space Agency NASA, has several other missions planned with the main mission being a trip to the asteroid belt to begin mining on several of the _Amor _asteroids. These asteroids, specifically the Amor III band has been of a fascination to scientists for many years as they have high concentrations of valuable minerals needed for industry here on Earth._ _The _Minerva_ missions will take with them a mass driver setup, basically a massive coilgun system, to begin sending finished products back to a _Lagrange_ point L2 near _Luna Base_. Once delivery starts, super concentrations of vital materials will begin to arrive at this point and will continue for some time until the asteroids are depleted. More environmentally friendly than strip mining on the Earth, NASA scientists hope to have several mass drivers setup to deliver key supplies for our burgeoning orbital industries both around the Earth and at the various Lagrange points in the Sun/Earth system setup and for the Earth/Moon set. _

_The reduced cost of launch vehicles and the fact that both the _Beagle II_ and the _Minerva_ spacecraft were built entirely in space has opened up a massive industry as more and more countries want access to such technologies. At this time, NASA spokesman Niels Andersen (nominally of the Danish space agency DTU Space), has announced that due to the unprecedented interest in space NASA will be offering up research grants to different science groups within those nations that are part of the UNE. As additional projects are contemplated for orbital stations and the possibility for actual cargo spacecraft moving between orbital stations around the Earth, Moon, and now around Mars the future is a bright place indeed._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from popular television show _Conspiracies now!_ first aired August 3, 2001

_Opening crawl comes up for the television show featuring "re-enactments" of popular events such as Roswell, regular abductions attempts, and grainy photographs and videos of recent spacecraft. As the images flit by, the screen slowly changes to that of a middle-aged man seated in a comfortable chair. He has a cultivated look of an Ivy League academic, but it is plain to see that he is anything but that image. Canned audience noise can be heard as the lights change to his image._

"Welcome one and all to another thrilling episode of *canned audience recites* _Conspiracies now!_, I am of course your debonair and dashing host Jens George. We have a wonderful set of footage for you that have been floating around the 'net at various sites. I have brought in several experts from within the UNE government *canned audience booing*, our good friends over at SETI *canned scattered applause*, and my personal favorite "Doctor" Jim Borgsen *canned applause is almost deafening*.

_The camera pans away to show the three figures seated to the left of the host with a variety of expressions ranging from pure indifference, to boredom, and ecstatic joy._

"Let's start first with Doctor Borgsen, welcome to the show once more Doctor."  
"I'm thankful for your invitation Jens and what fascinating footage that you were able to find! I have not seen anything so remarkable. I didn't realize that our sensor technology had advanced so much in such a short amount of time."

"That's great indeed doctor. Let me introduce our other guests who can shed some light on the video I want to show to all of you. Next to the good doctor *the doctor seems to preen at the praise* is the current director of SETI, Carl Sagan *the aged figure doesn't look well*. Our final guest is from the Public Relations Office for NASA, Doctor Caroline Chapman *a middle-aged woman who looks extremely bored*. Now, before we get opinions from our guests, without further ado here is the video we all want to see. If there are any young children, we must make mention that there is some cursing heard and some images may be a bit frightening to some audiences.

_A video begins to play with faint voices in the background. It becomes obvious to see that the conversation is between a bored operations controller on one of the Lagrange stations and a freight hauler coming back from Mars._

"_Tango 23, squawk IFF on 279.56"_

"_Hell, I just did Control. Is your equipment busted again?"_

"_That's a negative Tango 23, re-transmit your IFF, we're getting some kind of interference"_

_Muttered curses are heard and the freighter pilot carries out the orders. The camera footage appears to be from the primary viewer in the cockpit of the freighter._

"_Holy frak! What the hell was that? Control are you copying this?"_

"_Tango 23, no need for that kind of language. We have nothing on our scopes. Repeat last transmission."_

"_Shit… I ain't never seen anything like it Control. There's a damned flying saucer that just shot past my port cargo bay. It came out of this weird blue tunnel… damn thing looks like a funnel in space just appeared. Shit, sensors are off the charts."_

"_Tango 23, are you reporting an emergency?"_

"_Yes, dammit Control, I'm declaring an emergency. Shit… the port control system is down and I'm about to lose my frakking cargo pod on that side of the ship. What the hell was that thing?"_

"_Hold on Tango 23, repair craft have been dispatched to your position. Has your ship deviated from the shipping lane?"_

"_Hell if I know Control. Sensors are coming back on now. Frakking thing blew all the fuses with whatever it was. I hope the cockpit recorders got this thing. No one's going to believe me otherwise."_

_The image cuts out at this point, but soon opens up to another scene. The freighter's pilot is seen sitting in a white room. It is the very picture of the clichéd interrogation room from countless police series or detective shows. The freighter's pilot is a smaller young man quietly smoking a cigarette with an ashtray next to him littered with the remnants of several more. His expression is not one of happiness at his situation. A short time later, the door to the room opens and a pair of figures enters quietly. They are dressed in black suits, white collared shirts, and black ties. Both are wearing black mirrored sunglasses and they to appear to have been from a bad movie._

"_Well don't you two look the part. Men in Black come to interrogate me. So that makes a whole lot of sense, that thing actually was a UFO of some sort."_

"_Mister _[redacted]_, we are not Men in Black, but rather we are agents of the UNE. We aren't here to silence you, but rather to get your full testimony so that we may investigate this fully."_

"_Sure, sure… whatever you two say. I know I'm going to disappear into some dark government hole never to be seen again. Just get this half-assed interrogation over. I gotta make some big guy named Bubba happy he has a new bitch to break in…"_

"_Sir…"_

_At that, the pair led the freighter pilot away with a minimum of fuss and the video ends at this point._

"That was certainly incredible. Doctor Sagan your opinions please on the possible existence of UFOs:"  
"It is highly likely that extraterrestrial life does exist out there. It has long been theorized that radio signals and now video signals are moving throughout space around us. It was just a matter of when, not if, an alien civilization found us. Our moves into space, especially, have made this more of a likely encounter. The method by which the alien craft appeared in our solar system is unique as well. I have never seen that particular method of faster than light travel; well at least not in person compared to television show."

_The look on the face of the NASA representative changes ever so slightly as faster than light travel is mentioned. Unfortunately for her, the host does manage to catch the changing expression._

"Doctor Chapman, do you have anything you'd like to add to what Doctor Sagan mentioned?"

"Well… I'm not quite sure Jens… I've never actually seen something like that…"

_Her halfhearted answer is interrupted by "Doctor" Jim._

"Bullshit madam. I'll say it again Bullshit."

"Now Doctor Jim, there's no reason to be so crude to the lady."

"My apologies Jens and to you as well Doctor Chapman, I think you do know more than you're letting on. Has NASA developed any specific methods of faster than light travel? Why does that spacecraft look so familiar as well?"

_After a few furtive glances around, Doctor Chapman finally answers._

"Alright, we at NASA have been researching some methods by which we can travel faster than light. Unfortunately our scientific knowledge is lacking at this moment for all of our projects. We have theorized that it is indeed possible to travel faster than light, but not obtainable in our current dimension…

_Holds up her hands for silence._

"As I was saying… our current dimension does not appear to be able to support a spacecraft from traveling faster than light. Superluminal speeds are very possible, but we would need the correct environment. It is being theorized that there are several methods that could be possible. Either a different quantum state or even highly energized parts of space, usually referred to as subspace are possibilities. Our researchers have been stuck using probes trying to find these different quantum layers to our universe to see if it is possible. What we saw in the video does show that it is possible, we just need to find out how it really is possible to accomplish with our current technology level."

_A stunned silence is heard during the episode as each of the commentators digest what was just said. Predictably the host is the first to regain his wits._

"Truly excellent to hear Doctor Chapman. Does anyone else have anything to share with us? Ah, yes I do see that you're about to explode Doctor Jim. The floor is yours…"

"Thank you Jens. Yes, I'm intrigued most by the shape of the alien spacecraft that came through the tunnel. What exactly is it and why does it look so similar to what so many people have reported as an UFO, especially for those who have dealt with previous abductions? We have a need for answers and my latest book has those answers. I think it has more to do with the number of radio signals being sent out into the heavens and these aliens have come for a good time or to find out how the Skipper and Gilligan survive to make it off the island. There are countless methods to our madness and why are we trying to think of these aliens using a human mindset? Why do we continue to think that everyone else thinks just like us and wants to be like us? There's no reason for an alien species we have never met to be like us. What if they're hostile, what'll we do then?

_It is at this point, that the producer comes on screen with two "extras" and they pull the now hollering Doctor Jim off the set. The host looks barely ruffled by the circumstances and just smiles for the camera. Doctors Sagan and Chapman look incredibly embarrassed at being participants in the "debate." The camera fades to black as the two doctors attempt to ignore the attempts at discussion with the host. Just before the screen fades to black completely, Doctor Jim comes running past being chased by the "extras" and several security guards._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _The New England Journal of Medicine_ article _Effects of Space Travel and the Human Body and the Steps to Change it_, published April 13, 2006

_With the age of space travel upon us, it has been noted that the even with the capabilities of our science to produce gravity fields close to Earth's gravity, it has proved to be too little for to stop the physiological damage caused by reduced gravity on the human body. As we progress more towards longer duration space flights, it becomes even more of a risk. The decision to use a _von Braun wheel_ on several of our Lagrange stations is inspired, but does too little for those freighter pilots who are on the long voyages from Mars to those stations. It has been discussed several times that with the advances in medical science that we can begin to genetically modify humanity to better survive space travel. Genetic engineering or _geneering_ as it is beginning to be known, has the possibility of advancing humanity to the point where we may not need artificial gravity at all in our vessels._

_The decision to use _geneering_ on existing crews is possible, but was proven to be difficult in practice therefore using it on children born to these same crews quickly became a very popular concept. At first nearly banned by the various religions on Earth, they slowly came to realize that these adaptations were truly needed if humanity truly desired to expand into the stars. The _geneering_ concentrates on several key concepts; principally the modifications are to several key attributes: skeletal structure, internal membranes, and enhanced organs. Each modified individual receives a cocktail of modifications to their very bones and to their marrow inside the bones. A mix of the now common _Mithral _combined with titanium gives increased strength and durability to each of the long bones. Now more resistant to G-forces, the skeletal structure was further modified by the addition of _nanobots_ with factories of these _nanobots_ in the marrow of the femurs and humerus bones. These _nanobots_ augment the human body's natural immune system and also help to repair any fractures of the new skeletal system. Even with the new skeletal system, the muscles and internal membranes were also modified to handle the increased mass of the skeleton. _Nanobots_ are also infused into the muscles making them more resilient and less likely to atrophy during long duration space flight. Internal membranes were added around key organs that allow them to handle higher G-forces. These membranes also have the unintended side effect of protecting the vital organs from falls and injuries in space or while on the surface of a planet. The final adaptation was to the organs. They were made more efficient and better able to handle the stress of high G-forces. Fighter pilots have experienced G-loads in excess of 9 or even 10 G's during combat. Pilots do have their own methods of keeping blood flowing through their body during these moments of stress. The new _geneering_ eliminates the need for the usual exercises to control blood flow. The addition of an extra valve in the heart provides for the appropriate flow to continue to brain or to keep blood from pooling in the brain._

_Another aspect of _geneering_ that has barely been touched upon is the implantation of control circuitry in the brains and spinal columns of crewman. When it was determined that crewman could survive higher G-loads, it was found that pilots pushed themselves even further than before. It has been documented by the UNE military that several of their test pilots who were modified were able to take the new _Falchion_ fighter to even greater G-loads due to their augmentations. The reports from NASA was that several pilots were able to survive G-loads as high as 16 G's before they began to experience grey out or black out conditions. It was not until several test pilots blacked out and later died that a fault with the base _geneering_ was discovered; in their haste to develop membranes and enhanced muscles, the scientists did not think to enhance the circulatory system at the same time. With every individual with the base pilot _geneering_ now modified with stronger veins and arteries, additional testing was ordered for everyone who was augmented in this way. The UNE Congress took this a step further by making a law regulating the process of augmentations for non-augmented humans and for those who are augmented._

_While _geneering_ remains in its infancy, it is still astounding to think of the possibilities present with the technology and the future possibilities that can be unlocked with it. There is a good chance that as the technology matures that humans can be modified to survive on worlds previously thought as uninhabitable or on those without the "proper" atmospheric composition to support human life. Even the goal to introduce _nanoware_ into the human brain is a broad step forward for human evolution. The ability to have a computer miniaturized and fitted into the brain is just one of the possibilities. Scientists are already testing this new _nanoware_ on several test pilots to see if the traditional controls are unnecessary for flight operations or that the _nanoware_ can be used to control their spacecraft's controls while operating at high G-loads when they normally would be unable to reach their controls. While true mind controlled spacecraft will remain in the realm of science fiction, it is entirely possible that the new _nanoware_ can be used to supplement the already impressive computing power of the human brain._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from Kirishiac Council Chambers meeting December 25, 2009, released due to the Public Information Act 2042

"High Lord Ch'Lorna, what news do you bring to this assembly?"

"War Lord Du'kart, I bring news that humanity is inching even closer to our unveiling. They have mastered the atom, but not as we did. They instead chose to emulate their own star's power source and so use that to power their war machines. Our own technology that has been slowly introduced to them has become as much a part of their own that it is virtually indistinguishable. Their wars have shown all of us who are infiltrating their world that they are as much enamored of war as we once were before the hated Shadows forced us into exile. In fact within the next three of their years, they plan on opening a jump point using a focused Tachyon stream. I do believe that at this point, we should make ourselves known to the humans. I call for a vote of the Council. Do we show ourselves to the humans when they do open a jump point on their own or do we wait until they are contacted by another of the galaxy's races?"

_Muttering is heard and several comments are made, but not listed on the official transcript._

"High Lord Ch'Lorna, I hold in my hands the final tally of votes. The Council has voted 5-4 in favor of showing ourselves to the humans. What do you intend to give them once we have shown our presence in their midst for so long?"

"War Lord Du'kart, I fully intend to give them all of our technology from our height. While we have only shown them the basics, they have matured it beyond even where we were when it was first developed on Kirish. The Shadows will finally be destroyed and though we are all but destroyed, our legacy will live on with the humans. They will be a force of change in this galaxy."

**AN: Thank you for reading!**


	5. First Contact

**AN:** In light of some Anonymous reviews, I have made the decision to remove any review that is anonymous (it isn't difficult to create a account, I know, I did so that I could read my favorite authors on here), good or bad.

**Chapter 4 First Contact**

**Kirishiac Council Chambers  
****Location unknown**

"It is as you have said High Lord Ch'Lorna, these Humans or rather Terrans as they are now calling themselves have indeed sent out spacecraft to the outer worlds of their solar system. Is it true that these _Voyager_ craft have sensors specially calibrated to pierce the cloud cover on our people's prisons?"

"It is true indeed. The Terran Space Agency has been completely infiltrated and we have slowly been seeding our own sensor systems along with some of the more advanced Torvalus systems that we had taken when their territory was ours." The High Lord pauses while he tried to bring himself to the inevitable. "I must warn everyone that even though we have voted to give our technology to the Terrans when they complete their jump point experiment, we must prepare ourselves for a grisly task."

For a small time only silence is heard in the Kirishiac Council Chambers, but before the silence could become overwhelming, War Lord Du'kart made himself know. "What do you mean by your assertion that this will be a grisly task? These Terrans seem to be made of a fairly hardy stock, even though they can never match our resilience, they do have brilliant minds enough to make up for it." Taking his cue from the message, the High Lord responded. "Because my fellows, we may be all that is left of our race," as he held up his hands for silence. "We have not heard from any of our people for close to forty years as the Terrans count them. It is my fear that we are the last of our people. If that is the case, we must put plans in place to continue on our legacy even after our deaths."

As the debate continued on for many hours more, the assembled Kirishiacs approved a measure to place their thoughts and a copy of their memories into several memory storage systems. They then went out of their way to copy these storage systems and to make them able to be used with Terran systems, but just slightly past their current technological level to promote innovation. This would be their failsafe in case the scans by the pair of _Voyager_ probes could not find any trace of their once proud people. It was a sobering moment for the proud, but unbroken Kirishiacs and not one that many liked. The only other option would be death and loss of their very identity. With the looming tests by the Terran Space Agency on the minds of all present, they all were set to change the destiny of the human race.

***-EH-***

**Terran Space Agency Headquarters  
****Pusan Point, Mindanao, Philippines**

"Argyle Seven, we have a lock on your signal. Please transmit data package on band seven niner."

"Roger that Command, data package information is incoming. Just watch out the package is rather beefy and may suck up a bucket load of CPU time on your systems."

"Ah, roger that Argyle Seven, wait one moment please." Still air is heard for a moment with the faint sound of keys being pressed. "Transmission is received and we confirm receipt. Command out."

With that, the first of the data packages was transmitted from relay stations finally back to the Terran Space Agency's headquarters in the Philippines. Pusan Point had been chosen due to how close the territory was to the equator and the fact that at the time that portion of the southern Philippines had been barely settled. The few farmers in the area, a lush area that specialized in dried coconut, were a bit annoyed with the UNE when they announced their plans to build in this area. The increase in orders for dried coconut from tourists who all came to watch launches of launch vehicles and the increased revenue from having the main space agency for the entire planet soon quenched those arguments. Selection was a laborious process, but the Pusan Point Naval Station won out due to the Pacific Ocean being to one side and the vast distances that separated the base from the USNA's western coastline. That the Philippines had once been a territory under the control of the USNA following Spain's own loss close to two centuries before and later the Prussian's military defeat made the location even easier to use. Already used to supporting bases for the USNA's Navy and later the Terran Defense Force, the entirety of the Philippines was custom made for the Terran Space Agency. The beautiful beaches and clear blue water also had some effect on the planners as well.

Once the data packages were filtered through the equipment, the Kirishiacs present at the Terran Space Agency put their own filtering programs to work deciphering the images. Since the majority of the sensing equipment had been their own and placed on the spacecraft, it was easy enough for them to interpret the data without the filtering needed for human eyes. The images from _Voyager 2_ were painful for them as it concentrated on Saturn and on Neptune. Neptune showed no life at all on the "surface (at least what the Kirishiacs would consider the surface of the gaseous world)" and Saturn only showed a few settlements that remained standing and even fewer of their people on the surface of the world. _Voyager 1_ with its tasking of Jupiter and Uranus was the last hope of the Kirishiacs. Uranus was as barren as Neptune, but the surface of Jupiter did show the presence of several settlements that were still occupied. A quick tachyon transmission to the High Lord related these findings and hastened the council's eventual decision further still.

***-EH-***

**Kirishiac Council Chambers  
****Location: various (Terra, Jupiter, and Saturn)**

The goal of moving themselves entirely to new bodies was decreed for all of the Kirishiacs and a message was tight beamed and relayed through several Terran outposts that would eventually get to the few Kirishiacs who survived on the surface of Jupiter. Their new orders would be to begin to produce as much of their stolen technology in quantities for eventual dissemination to the Terrans. The stolen technology from the Torvalus, taken during the Kirishiacs own war against the other First Ones, was the first of the gear to be mass produced. Used ably by the infiltrators on Earth, those few pieces obtained centuries ago would be of some use to the Terrans. Perhaps the most controversial of all would be the technology gained from the last world to be conquered by the Kirishiacs, Z'ha'dum. It was ironic that the final conquest would lead to their defeat, but the chance for payback against the Shadows would be justice to many Kirishiacs and using their own technology against them poetic justice. Slowly building their memory devices, each of the Kirishiacs had a chance to contemplate their new place in the universe and many lamented that they would not be able to send out their fleets into the void anymore. Bitter sweet memories were all that they had of their empire, but the promise of the Terrans to surpass them in all ways tempered those same memories.

Plans were sent to the infiltrators on Earth and all members of what remained of the once proud Kirishiac people slowly prepared themselves for their end. For those among the infiltrators, they had watched humanity grow and change with each passing decade. The advancement of technology and the cultural changes wrought by the advancement of technology was fresh in their minds. The thought that they would be able to witness the crowning achievement of the Terrans, the minimal standard for ascension as a First One race, was awe inspiring. The general consensus was that the other First Ones would deny the Terrans their place, because of the arrogance of the other species for no other reason and for the simple fact that the Terran race was advanced due to the "interference" of another First One. Even with the gentle nudging of the infiltrators, the amazing potential of the Terrans would astound and equally frighten the rest of the galaxy. Many chose to remember this point as they went about the process of transferring their memories into the data cores.

Each data core was to be grown from a Terran creature, the mere polyp, and seeded with advanced chemicals and metals (all familiar to the Terrans due to their use of the Mass Reducer/Increaser). The polyp would also serve to increase the Terran's ability to modify this biological construct for use in their ships (or so the thought went for the Kirishiacs). As each finished storing their memories and their very thought processes in the specially grown data cores, they slowly began to drift together to remember their once glorious past. Their metaphorical children would take up their place as the Masters of Gravity.

***-EH-***

**Official Transcript for Operation Star Bound  
****Experiment 47-A, December 15, 2012**

**Experiment Summary:** Professor Atlas and Team Star Bound – consisting of six section leaders and fifteen assistants – are testing the theory that a tightly packed tachyon burst will open a portal into a different dimension in space. Previous tests had all failed to cause anything to happen; either due to not enough tachyons in the burst, or a burst package was not too tightly focused, or even in one instance a burst package that was too tightly focused. As the team prepared their latest package, all of the test parameters met their calculated results. Using a spiral method the tachyons were woven in a helical pattern around a primary tachyon pulse. The entire was to be transmitted once the test equipment was put in place. All previous attempts resulted in nothing happening and the one attempt that came close only worked for a few microseconds.

The spacecraft that had the injection package mounting was sitting just outside Jupiter's orbit near the moon of Io. Last minute preparations were still being done and some staff began to take wagers on this package failing as well. At last, the data package was properly showing readiness.

_ATLAS_: Is everything all set? Unauthorized personnel out? Everyone seated behind your monitors? All right. Good luck everyone. Devers send the activation signal.

_DEVERS_: Charge is now at 100 percent sir.

_ATLAS_: Trethers, measuring instruments in place?

_TRETHERS_: Yes, sir.

_ATLAS_: Ok, Lorna set the cameras to record the event. Countdown from five, four, three, two, one, activate!

[Professor Atlas pressed the activation button on his console. For several seconds nothing seemed to happen, until the test rig fired off the tachyon package into space. As the tachyon stream was fired out, it only traveled for several kilometers before the entire package winked out of existence. In the place of the tachyon stream an orange/red funnel had opened in space. The staff scattered from the main monitor to rush back to their stations to record this new phenomenon.]

_ATLAS_: My God, am I hallucinating?

_LORNA_: Professor, the tachyon package successfully transmitted. The power coming off that funnel is off the scale!

_ATLAS_: Which means what?

_LORNA_: We got a brief glimpse of another reality, a higher energy plane than our own.

_ATLAS:_ I think it's time we get rip-snorting drunk, don't you?

***-EH-***

******Excerpt from the Press Conference for Operation Star Bound**  
December 21, 2012

_MODERATOR_: Welcome everyone to this momentous occasion. The scientists and engineers assigned to Operation Star Bound have made a massive discovery this past week. For the past year, Professor Jason Atlas and his team have been attempting to reach a higher plane of existence within our own reality. It wasn't until six days ago that they were able to succeed in this endeavor. They successfully opened a portal using a burst of high energy particles a total of seven times over the past six days. The testing was done out near the Jupiter's moon Io and far enough away from any of the asteroid mining facilities. Professor Atlas, your thoughts on this event?

_ATLAS_: It was most certainly an event that took us all by surprise. After so many failed attempts to even create the tachyon package, we finally succeeded and it truly worked. So much of the work done was by several of our team. One I'd like to point out is Lorna Edison [A petite young woman stands up when mentioned by Professor Atlas], without her work, we never would have gone as far as we did. We stand at the cusp of a new age. Our reason for this press conference is to send a robotic spacecraft through one of these energy funnels using the same tachyon burst that has worked so successfully.

[The camera pulls back to show a large view screen on the wall behind Professor Atlas. The display shows a view of space that then slowly rotates until a small spacecraft is now visible. On the front of the spacecraft is a bulky box-like structure with a long barrel emerging from the system]

As you can see here, the package itself is completely self-contained and aside from some connectors to the spacecraft, it can be removed easily and re-attached as well. The only issue that we've seen so far is that the module is only usable twice. That itself is something that we'll be working on as we delve a bit more into the technology and as we begin to understand it more, we can foresee that these drive systems can be smaller and even more powerful than what we see here. Enough about the system itself, let's get this show on the road…

[Professor Atlas moves over to his console and presses several buttons and the image changes as a burst of tachyons are fired and a cone shaped vortex opens in space. Reds and oranges are all visible as the cone opens into a different layer of space itself briefly revealing an area of deep reds and black before the spacecraft ignites the onboard ion engine and hurtles through the vortex. Everyone there watch spellbound as the ship accelerates to an unheard of speed, but when it strikes an eddy in hyperspace, the spacecraft is torn apart and the signal ends.]

Well that was certainly interesting there folks. We have a few more things to work out, but I do believe [at this Professor Atlas waves his hands broadly towards his team], I mean _we_ believe that this is truly an advancement for our people.

_EDISON:_ I do believe Professor that this moment heralds something else entirely.

[With those words, the petite young woman looks as though she's standing in a heat distortion and in now a massive figure fills her place. The looks from her colleagues at the sight range from frightened to pure incredulity that the young woman they once knew could be more than that. Standing more than twenty feet tall, the figure stands in a power armor suit that makes it seem even larger.]

Yes, I am not human, though you do not seem to be entirely surprised Professor Atlas.

_ATLAS_: I always suspected that life existed outside our own sphere. I never knew that you weren't human, but you were always more than that to the team. I for one do not care that you are not human, but your work with us has always been exceptional. I do have to ask if you spoon fed us the information that we needed to get to this point?

[The armored figure looked around the room at those assembled and all of them had the same look on their faces. It was only the long time spent on Terra that allowed the High Lord's own daughter to answer the question.]

_EDISON_: We have been walking a fine line as infiltrators and teachers. As you can see [an expansive sweep of her armored hands] we do not have the same physiology that you have nor do we have some of the same motivations that you have as well. We are a dying race and were imprisoned here for over a millennia. We saw what your race is capable of doing from intercepted communications over radio waves long into your development and early during I prison term. Our race's life span is almost over and we have been grooming you and giving you some technologies that got you to this point in time. You may have been given the basic technologies at first, but you were the ones to develop those airships and anti-gravity platforms that have been a staple in your military. That alone has surprised us and we stand on the cusp of what many outside your solar system have come to measure as a stepping stone towards entry into the galactic community, the ability to enter hyperspace.

_ATLAS_: That explains why you've only aided us here and there… What advances did we actually come up with and what have you gifted to us?

_EDISON_: Oddly enough it was not until you created the radio and began using that technology did we even realize that this system was inhabited by a life form that was still developing. We slowly began to insert ourselves with some technology that we had taken on our own and used it to infiltrate you..

_ATLAS_: Does that mean that you killed whoever was in your way?

_EDISON_: No. We did not kill anyone at all. It was felt by the High Lord that it would be counter-productive to developing a relationship to you and the Council was voted down. We insinuated ourselves into the lives of your best scientists. In some cases we manipulated things so that we could come together. The best example of this was when Von Braun and his team came to the USNA's facility in Canada. Your own brilliance at times was the result of the technology that you enjoy. We do have some things that will make your own quest for the stars even better equipped than before and we can also aid you as we can.

[The armored individual looks at the shocked faces around it and adds one final bit before the meeting descends into anarchy]

We are dying off, albeit slowly. Our own bodies cannot handle the time spent away from a high gravity world, in spite of the encounter suits that we wear. Those few who remain of our people have been placing their thoughts and memories inside storage matrices that we will gift to the nations of this world. Those higher learning institutions where we taught and worked will be the ones who will benefit the most, but others will also. We know of your internet capabilities and we will disseminate all of our knowledge there as well. While my people die off, your people can become what we were best known as: the Masters of Gravity. That is our legacy and we leave it to you.

[This final statement is met with complete disbelief and the armored figure moves away and is joined by others that materialize out of the crowd. As Professor Atlas tries to call for calm, there is anything but while the conference fractures apart.]

In the aftermath of Professor Atlas' press conference and the realization that humanity was not alone in the universe, very little truly happened. At first disbelief and anger were the most common of emotions experienced by many as they looked at their world being changed before their eyes. Of course those were the people who didn't believe that there existed a space program or that ships were regularly going back and forth between Luna, Mars, and Terra. They were also the ones who chose to ignore the massive anti-gravity airships that plied their trade across continents and oceans. On the other side of the fringe were those who chose to take their own lives than to live on anymore. Oddly enough these individuals seem to be from the more fringe religions and religious leaders and celebrities. Several cults were formed around the information that humanity was no longer alone, but after a while as more was released showing the world what "aliens" looked like, they quickly folded as people had better things to do and places to see.

All in all, the world went on about their day and many people looked forward to the advances that were sure to come as the Kirishiac memory cores were passed around and the information disseminated further from the internet sites that were created. Changing the world bit by bit, the new information was a startling glimpse into the minds and history of a people who were around when people still thought the Terra was flat or that fire was a mythical substance from the heavens. These shocks to the collective systems of so many scientists and historians gave new light to the thought that the divine beings and demons purported to exist in the world were in fact other older races who visited Terra. The released history of how the Kirishiacs went on a massive crusade against the other "First Ones" became an instant bestseller and many other books about their past and present became available. The exodus of Kirishiac from Jupiter and the other outer planets to Terra only added more to the numbers present on Terra and the growing sense of self that native Terrans began to feel towards these giant "aliens."

Advances continued to move forward and the pace human development began to change further. Always looking forward now, the human race had a goal and that was to take on fully the mantle and title passed down to them. They would become the Masters of Gravity.

**AN: Thank you for reading!**


	6. On the Way to Greatness

**Chapter 5 On the Way to Greatness**

Times Picayune, letter to the editor January 3, 2013

_The harsh reality that humanity is not alone in the universe came as surprise to some and some on the fringe; it was the vindication of their life's work. Adherents have proclaimed loudly in many cases that the whole incident with Professor Atlas' press conference was simply all a hoax and the aliens seen there were just graduate assistants dressed in costumes. The appearance of several more of the aliens, these Kirishiacs, at different scientific conferences in multiple locations has stilled these rumors and claims of conspiracy theories. It is unique in the minds of many that the theories of the past and advances in technology have been the result of what can only be called tampering with our past. Many of those making those claims would prefer that we go back to the days where horses instead of modern antigravity craft were the preferred mode of transportation. _

_It is invigorating to know that we truly live in a modern age and that we are not alone out there. The great beyond no longer poses a mystery, or at least aside from who else is out there. That question alone is what truly frightens me; what others are out there? Are they friendly like these Kirishiacs seem or are they only going to see us as a race they can exploit?_

_These thoughts should follow others, but the questions come too quickly now that some thought is given to the nature of the universe that has been opened up to us as humanity. Do we extend Monroe's Doctrine to the stars or are we forever expected to hold fast to our own system. We now have the means to travel to other stars and with the advanced technology given to us by the Kirishiacs we can begin to construct colony worlds and outposts. The only thing stopping this idea is the one that humanity has had to deal with all along: ourselves._

***-EH-***

_Top Gear Season Finale_ Transcript, Season 8 (3rd Reboot of series 2015) First aired December 2023 on BBC2

Clarkson: Welcome once more to an exciting episode of _Top Gear_. In a break from our usual format of dealing with cars, we've been given an opportunity by the UNE's Navy to tour their first dedicated ship design. The new _Tethys_-class can be considered to be a variety of ship classes, if you follow the current or past conventions, but the UNE Navy has declared that the ship is intended for use as a Patrol Ship.

Hammond: It is without a doubt one of the more advanced ships out there, in fact it makes even the locally made _Typhoon_ of the League nations look like an AMC Eagle Wagon in performance.

[Muted laughs from the audience on hand.]

Clarkson: Indeed, we have a treat for you all. I'm certain that you all know The Stig!

[Considerable cheering and applause is heard for the helmeted figure, which goes up considerably when three figures all step forward. Each of the helmeted figures are dressed in flight suits instead of their usual garb]

Clarkson: What many of you did not know is that we use a trio of specialty drivers, each of them known as The Stig, who test out all new vehicles. Since the new _Tethys_ is not a super car or any variety of car, we were able to get all three of our Stigs to show up for this occasion.

[Camera pans away and focuses on James May who stands next to a large screen display]

May: What little is known about the development program of the UNE Navy following the big First Contact announcement with the Kirishiacs is that we know for certain that humanity is not alone. Information from the Kirishiacs in all manner of devices and technologies has gone a long way towards the development of a true space navy.

The Kirishiac technologies have certainly helped in this instance. The _Tethys_ is a wonder of modern engineering along with some older ideas that are fully tested. The biggest change for ship design is the fact that the class is setup with a feature referred to as Smart Modularity.

Hammond: What exactly do you mean by Smart Modularity? What does that have to do with ship designs or why even bother with such a system?

Clarkson: From the press releases that we've been given by the UNE, the whole Smart Modularity idea is that each weapons bay, sensor cluster, powerplant, or even the engines can all be swapped out wholesale in the event of upgrades or to replace damaged parts. It is a fairly unique idea if I must say so myself.

[An image of the _Tethys_ comes up on the screen behind James May. The ship looks like an elongated lozenge with a quartet of strange rectangular boxes two thirds of the way down the ship. A quartet of turrets are visible on each of the rectangular boxes and what appears to be a large hanger bay is visible just forward of these boxes]

May: As you can see here on the screen the _Tethys_ is a fairly basic looking ship. The only really unique part of the whole ship, aside from the Smart Modularity, is that the ship is atmospheric capable. Compared to the ships that the Kirishiacs have shown technical specifications of it is not much to look at, but it is also wholly a human designed ship. Unlike the Kirishiac's Lordship, the _Tethys_ is built with technologies that we understand and perhaps the most important point, it doesn't look like something they would build.

Clarkson: Why is that so important what our ships look like?

May: Simply put, the Kirishiacs were imprisoned here by the race they're calling the Shadows and these Shadows have exceptionally tough ships and hyper-advanced technology. Why should be put out ships that look just like the Kirishiacs, especially when we're more than likely going to have to deal with the Shadows in the future also?

Hammond: Do you really see that as a possibility?

May: They wouldn't have given us this technology unless they wanted us to use it and the Shadows are the biggest threat out there.

[The next few scenes are a montage of shots of the new _Tethys_ as it is visible from the massive Space Station _Freedom_ in orbit around Earth. The camera pans past numerous grey walled hallways and common areas onboard the ship, looking much like any other warship tour. The only difference is that windows to the outside are few and far between, unlike some of the early antigravity ships. The trio of helmeted Stigs all took their place on the bridge of the _Tethys_ as the ship pulls away from the spacedock. Each of them will get a chance to test fly the new ship and their reactions will be summed up by the hosts on the next episode]

***-EH-***

_Expanding Horizons for Earth_ article published June 2030 _Science Now_ trade publication

_The development of actual ships that made use of the technologies both researched and given by the Kirishiacs quickly led to a number of other advances. The need to alleviate overcrowding on Earth pushed many to call for widespread colonization endeavors using the new technologies. A number of large orbiting satellites and remote craft were sent out to promising worlds. The use of advanced sensor equipment built using specifications from the Kirishiacs made this search even easier, but the intended goal of easing overcrowding took some time. Each of these worlds would need to be checked out to see if they would be acceptable to human habitation. _

_At first the searches for habitable worlds were limited to those that had abundant resources, but the limitations of overcrowding and resources quickly give scientists other criteria to work with. Instead of using only those worlds that fell within the habitation zones of the various stars around Earth, the advanced gravitic technologies provided by the Kirishiacs would be used to make previously overlooked worlds suitable to development as well. Some of these worlds were similar enough to Kirish that the advanced gravitics would be necessary for humans to even colonize such a world. _

_The advanced gravitic shielding and gravity generation would be hard pressed to survive on some of the proposed colony worlds, but societal pressures and the quickly growing press of humanity caused these worlds to be colonized as well. The first world that was selected was one that was relatively further than expected from Earth. Called _New Earth_ by the first colony teams, the world was the first one found to contain fresh water like that on the human homeworld. Found in the Tau Ceti system, _New Earth_ is a distance of thirteen light years from Earth. More than pretty vistas and exotic animals, the minerals on the world were an unexpected boon to the first colonists. Further colony efforts would be buoyed by the amazing world that lay before mankind._

_The problem soon found by the explorer teams was that many of the eligible worlds, i.e. those worlds that had biospheres capable of supporting human life, were already colonized by other races. The presence of oddly shaped lattices in several of these systems has proved to be a turning point as well for the colony teams. Each of these structures has been identified as Jump Gates by the Kirishiac Remnant on Earth. Evidently these structures have been seeded around the galaxy at the behest of another of the First Ones, the Vorlons, who first mastered their use. The setup of Earth's colony ships and explorers preclude the use of these gates with each ship using their own means of transiting to hyperspace._

_Each of these Jump Gates is identifiable by a tachyon signature that reaches into hyperspace and through the use of specialty sensors (provided by the Kirishiacs) they are able to be detected and mapped. A large map has slowly been compiled by the Explorer Division of Bureau 11 showing each of these gates. Until each of the systems with a Jump Gate has been identified and studied, it is impossible send a colonization team there to study the system. _

_This lack of knowledge has led to a number of sub-standard systems being selected for colonization by Earth's explorers. These systems have become a number of inside-out worlds. Each of these worlds look like a dead world in a lackluster star system, but the interior of each world has been hollowed out and the interiors are terraformed to provide a stable biosphere. Not as well liked since they are little better than the habitation domes on Mars or Venus, they are an alternative to more widely known worlds that contain a Jump Gate._

_At the same time as these inside-out systems were being discovered, a momentous discovery of a very close system to Earth in the form of Rigil Kentarus made headlines across the planet. It was the first system found where both the habitable planet also had a habitable moon. The system also was very unique in that it lacked a Jump Gate and the position of the world was incredibly close to Earth; only four light years away. _

_Further study by colony experts has shown that the reason why these systems seem to be without a Jump Gate is that hyperspace in these regions is of an incredibly turbulent nature. This incredible turbulence in this region of space could be why Earth was passed by so many of the other races and also why it was selected as a prison by the Shadows for the Kirishiacs. Regardless, this dearth of Jump Gates and inhabited worlds by other sapient life forms has led to a number of worlds being colonized._

***-EH-***

_Jump Drives and Their Implications on Space Travel_ article in _Popular Science_ May 2036

_Jump Drives are marvelous pieces of technology that allow any manner of ships to transition to the realm of hyperspace. Considered to be the "stepping stone" to elevation as a species, jump travel seems to be the defining moment for many civilizations in their quest to explore the stars. All ships operated by the UNE, be they Navy or civilian shipping, all make use of the revolutionary Jump Drive._

_Using a stream of tachyons, this burst of superluminal particles causes a rift in time and space to open that allows a spacecraft to transit through this bizarre space. The number of extreme eddies and turbulence in the area around Earth has caused Earth ship to rely on a different system of sensors for this volatile space. Instead of using a triangulation method, whereby each ship uses the position of Jump Gates to determine their position in pace, Earth's ships instead use a powerful Tachyon Scanning System that shows them their position relative to "_normal_" space. This leaves ships coming from Earth to the outer colonies with the ability to function in areas where no Jump Gates exist and also allows them to travel away from the more commonly found hyperspace travel "lanes."_

_The actual device that is used to fire the stream of tachyons needed to open a Jump Point is fairly simple in design. It resembles a massive cannon that is mounted on the lower surface of many ships, but is referred to as a hyperspace projector. Given the atmospheric capabilities of humanity's ships, the cannon is housed in a blister that is well shielded and armored to protect it from atmospheric entry. The projector features a pair of emitters that are changed out after use. Each Earth ship has at their disposal as many as twenty emitter pairs allowing for up to twenty simultaneous jumps; that is one emitter is used to open a Jump Point in normal space and the second is used to open a Jump Point from hyperspace back to normal space. After they are used, the emitter pairs are simply ejected and a new pair can be put in place with a feed system reminiscent of a coilgun. The projector system is simply powered by the very common Energy Captor System that is found on every Earth ship in production._

_While considered to be an anachronistic method of hyperspace travel as opposed to the methods used by other races, the lack of reliance on the Jump Gate network has made the projector system highly usable by a number of ship designs. Many civilian ships and even some private yachts are able to mount the projector (the smallest ship to date with the system is barely 100 meters long), but are limited in the number of emitters that they can carry. This lack of emitters has led to a brisk market for new emitters at many of the space stations setup to handle incoming ships. This has also led to development of a more permanent system to open jump points for shipping that is currently being tested on UNE Navy ships._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _The Fall of the United Nations of Earth and the Rise of the Terran Hegemony_ Published 2054 _Avalon Press_

_For many years, the united nations of Earth came to be under the governance of the United Nations of Earth (UNE) and they prospered during this time. The problem that came up for this unified governmental structure is that same that has plagued all governments before and since then; they became too large and overly bureaucratic for their own good. When the UNE started out they only held a small handful of Bureaus that handled aspects of the governance in the fields of horticulture, biology, and technology. These Bureaus soon ballooned to twelve after the announcement of Alien life on Earth. With so many committees and sub-committees being formed, they began to get in the way of each other, especially those committees related to defense activities and technological development._

_Slowly the bureaucratic inertia became too much for the UNE. Requests for supplies from the first colonies founded on the Moon, Mars, and the outer system outposts began to become backlogged due to infighting between the various scientific Bureaus and the supply Bureaus. This lead to the infamous food riots on Mars and the loss of a start-up colony on Venus due to lack of supplies. After the supply situation was solved on Mars a certain degree of resentment remained against the inept rule of the UNE._

_The nations that first started up the UNE, among them the original League nations, a quiet rebellion became fermenting to change how the UNE did business. Other tensions among the various colonies, especially those who met the UNE's self-sufficiency guidelines for nation status, threatened to throw the government of Earth into even greater tensions. Changes needed to be made and soon before the UNE lost complete control over the various nations that fell under its remit. Unfortunately for the bureaucracy that had developed that time came too late._

_The last motion passed within the UNE was to officially change the name of the government, especially since the first colonies had already passed their self-sufficiency guidelines, and many of them no longer identified themselves as members of Earth's governments. In their attempt to unite all of humanity, the government voted to change the name of the UNE to the Terran Alliance. Earth had been known as Terra for centuries before and the name was widely accepted since even though an individual identified themselves as being from another colony world, they all were Terrans. _

_This development of a new cultural identity also resulted in calls for a new form of government. Rather than using the structure setup by the UNE, also used by the previously proposed and failed League of Nations, the new government would be setup where each world or colony would have a number of Senators based on the number of citizens present. A set figure of one Senator per ten thousand population members (those of voting age, which was set at 16) was decided upon as a good equalizer as it gave even developing colonies some voice in the forming Senate._

_Once the development of the new government structure decided upon and the name selected for the governing body, the location for this governing body became key. Much like when the UNE selected Bermuda for their central location (along with the lack of ties to any of the super powers at the time), the new Terran Senate would need to be located somewhere neutral. While everyone agreed that the Terran Senate and governmental offices should be in the Sol system, it was after all the Terran system, there were objections from Senators from Mars and Venus (plus most of the outer colonies) against having the location actually on Terra. _

_A large space station was constructed in the Sol system. The basic design of the station was for a station that could function as both a waypoint for in system trade and as a hub for all out system trade coming into the Sol system. Tourist facilities and massive hydroponic facilities were included in the station as well as the government offices. Unlike the Von Braun style stations (most notably _Freedom, Liberty, and Honor_) that were already at the various Lagrange points around Terra, the new station would be at different point "above" the Sol system. Termed as a zenith point, the newly named _Babylon Station_ would be a home away from home and a port of call for millions of residents. The massive cylindrical station measures over ten kilometers in length and features a fully gravitic maneuvering drive system to relocate the station._

_The advances in communications also led to the ability for those Senators from developing worlds to have access to instantaneous communications back to _Babylon Station_ and further on for all of the Terran worlds. The development of Terra's colonies in systems that did not feature Jump Gates also allowed for a number of small way stations and outposts to be built (mostly robotic and unmanned stations) that would allow for repair of a damaged spacecraft and for communication hubs to be placed between the colonies._

_As new systems slowly joined the Terran Senate, the original name of the Terran Alliance slowly changed to the Terran Hegemony. Terra would keep her hold over the expansion of colonies and outposts, but the individual government of each world was their own. Each system could administer their systems and aside from taxes owed for the upkeep of the stations in orbit (on a rotating lease that each world could later buy out) and for the Navy, each system could do as they pleased with their own tax revenue. This quickly led to several systems, most notably New Earth, as a center for research and development in the Terran Hegemony. _

_Numerous Hegemony Research and Development (HRAD) facilities began to spring up across Terra's surface and on worlds like New Earth that further led to more innovations that improved each world's standard of living._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _Tethys_ class patrol ship log, January 13, 2055

_While on a routine patrol, our ship detected a hyperspacial disturbance over Terra's southern pole. As the closest naval vessel in the area, we investigated the disturbance and found an odd collection of ships that had come through the jump point. They looked like a squid flying through space. Each of them was green in color and had a number of what could only be tentacles coming from the front of each ship._

_As per HAF Navy procedures, a warning was sent to the ships, but after the warnings were ignored a series of warning shots were fired at them. The forward coilgun mount fired a salvo of shots that all shot past the collection of ships and really took their notice. With their progress now arrested and other larger ships moving into position near them, the alien ships opened another jump point and fled the Sol system._

_It is my understanding that patrols have been increased in the area and that one of them spotted what appears to be a UFO coming out of one of the jump points. It too was warned off and the crew attempted to run away from the patrol vessel. A chase ensued and the UFO, later identified as an actual saucer shaped craft disappeared into a jump point as well. _

***-EH-***

Vorlon High Council Chambers, February 2055

The congress of minds older than many within the Hegemony (aside from the Kirishiac Lords who remained) met to discuss the latest setback in seeding humanity with the telepathy gene. Each of the Councilors present expressed their outrage that three of their seeding fleets had been met with warships from a world that should not be as technologically advanced. From the first failed mission disrupted by a small patrol craft to the most recent mission stopped by a larger cruiser led force, the Vorlons had no success using either poles to develop their base for seeding humanity. The Vorlons were slowly becoming alarmed that their Circle would start to collapse if humanity could not be seeded with telepathy and their genome modified to see the Vorlons in the best possible light.

_It is intolerable Kosh Naranek that you defend these primitives against our will. It is our right to uphold the Circle and to make certain that it does not fail against the Shadows. This system was briefly touched by the _Others_ and even now they still retain ships here. They are hidden away on the fourth world and on the moons around the fifth and sixth world and yet you want us to leave them alone._

The congress of minds floated freely inside their chamber. Appearing as blobs of light that swirled and moved around each other, the growing mental agitation could be seen by their movement.

_It is not what you think Ulkesh Naranek, the technological capabilities of this race are not at all what we have seen. I fear that they have found technology too fast and not just the technology that we had planned for them to find as before. So much of what is seen is not what the _Others_ have at their disposal and despite their appearance in this system, they more than likely are not to blame. Perhaps the humans have developed this technology on their own and we have been foolish to think that we can push them._

A moment of silence is heard as each of the ancient race pondered on the implications of what was said between two of their Councilors. That the humans had developed technology able to view their ships and they were able to fire on them troubled many of those present. They had always planned on the humans gaining technology, it was how the Circle worked after all, but this technology would destabilize the Circle. Their own favored children would be powerless against weaponry and sensors that could sense even their advanced technology. All present pondered on the situation.

_It would seem to be that we are in agreement with each other. No more seeding attempts will be done, especially since these humans appear to be on guard for our presence. We will discontinue the seeding flights, but we will have ships stationed nearby our seeded Jump Gates. Once the humans make use of one of the gates to move around the galaxy, we will swoop down on their latest colony world and our Circle will not be disrupted. We will defeat the _Others_ once and for all and show that our viewpoint is the correct path. Let it be so my brethren…_

***-EH-***

Terran Hegemony wide broadcast following hostile contact with an alien race, October 2063

_This is an urgent news bulletin to all Terran Hegemony citizens that we currently are at war with an alien race known only as the Koulani Directorate. One of our outer rim colonies at 61 Cygnus A II was recently attacked by a force of alien ships bearing odd markings. The colony was heavily damaged and several of the environmental domes have collapsed from the damage. The 61 Cygnus A II system is located spinward of Terra and is one of our furthest colonies in a relatively uncharted and minimally inhabited area of space._

_The HAF Navy dispatched several _Tyche_ Cruisers that are leading Task Forces to find the homeworld of the Koulani. Their current orders are to enforce our borders and if necessary to destroy any Koulani shipping nearby. A diplomatic team has also been dispatched and will attempt to end the conflict with a peaceful resolution._

_At this time, it is urged for all citizens to be on the lookout. It is not known if any rationing of supplies or jump emitters may be needed. All citizens are urged to give your support to our Navy and other defenders. A Hegemony wide fund has been setup to help those at the research stations at 61 Cygnus A II recover from this disaster._

_Thank you all for your time._

***-EH-***

After Action Report, HAF Navy encounter with Koulani Directorate over Koula, homeworld for Koulani

To: HAF Fleet Command

From: Commodore Harold Desmond, commander Task Force 12

Fleet Command, it is my sincere pleasure to report that combat actions have been completed against the forces of the Koulani Directorate when Task Force 12 jumped into their system. A small force of Destroyer and Cruiser analogues were present over the world of Koula along with a number of large spacestations that were setup as defense points. TF12.1 and TF12.2 were sent to deal with the spacestation, while TF12.3 and TF12.4 were dispatched to handle the Koulani fleet. TF12.5 was held in reserve to exploit any openings or to support a squadron in trouble.

Each of the _Tyche_-led squadrons had no problems, especially as the _Oracle_ corvettes did their job well enough to secure the flanks from attack. I will report that the new antigraviton cannons on the _Tyche_ class functioned without a problem, though the supply requirements to keep the coilguns taxed fleet logistics after only a few battles. The spinal mounted heavy coilgun on the _Tyches_ could use more work as well due to overheating when alternative munitions were used against the Koulani fleet. A few of the faster ships used by the Koulani also point to the need for a faster ship to take out enemy shipping that cannot be destroyed quickly. The need for missiles was also keenly felt by those squadrons that dealt with the Koulani spacestations.

All in all, Task Force 12 was able to complete the objectives laid out for us. Their spacestations were heavily damaged/destroyed and those fleet elements in orbit were destroyed completely by the massed heavy coilgun fire from the _Tyche_ cruisers. Diplomatic parties have arrived and aside from guardian duty for the diplomatic team, Task Force 12 remains onsite in case of attack by the Koulani or by other hostile species.

Sensors have picked up several ships jumping into the system and then fleeing when challenged by fleet elements. The profiles do not match any of the known alien races in the area nor do they match what is known of the various First Ones. With this in mind, I have detached TF12.5 to remain in hyperspace near the Koulani homeworld near the Jump Gate to monitor system traffic. TF12.3 and TF12.4 have been merged for the time being and are spread over the entirety of the system to monitor these disturbances as they happen.

End of report.

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _Beginning Anew, a History of the Terran Hegemony's Development_ Avalon Press, 2064

_The Terran Hegemony started out strong with their development of what has been termed _Reverse Terraforming_ with the invention of the Inside-out Worlds. These planets are all in systems that would normally not be hospitable to human life, but the understanding of gravitics has allowed worlds to flourish where none would normally be available. Close in systems (those less than five light years from Terra) have all be colonized by the Terran Hegemony with many of these systems gaining at the very least two of the Inside-out Worlds._

_Each of these worlds is hollowed out and gravitics are used to cause enough rotation on the world that it simulates "normal" Terran standard gravity within. The outer areas of each world are studded with airlocks and defense installations to protect them from invading forces. However, the main defense for many of these worlds is their lack of Vorlon seeded Jump Gates. This lack of Jump Gates has made it possible for worlds to be relatively hidden from the rest of the galaxy unless they have the appropriate stellar coordinates logged or if they make use of the Terran jump drive system._

_Each of the newly formed worlds is almost completely reliant on food stuffs and other supplies in their initial phase of development. After each world has been prepared and food production begun, these supplies soon trickle off to only luxury goods (unless made there) and some spare parts not provided there. After each world is certified for colonization, it is opened to citizens on Terra who wish to escape their overcrowded world. Each of these colonists is given the opportunity to move wholesale, i.e. all of their belongings and even their pets, due to each move being permanent once they leave Terra._

_While considered by many to be heavy-handed, the Hegemony policy of completes moves does give each potential colony the ability to retain a number of trained individuals. While the Inside-out Worlds are not the same as a planet capable of supporting human life, they do represent a massive scientific achievement due to their manufactured status. Each of the worlds can run the gamut of types, but most retain a Terra-like biosphere, though many do tend to run more towards a temperate environment. It is not unheard of for several worlds in a given system to develop numerous environments and to market the system as a vacation paradise. These systems can have multiple planets with diverse ecosystems ranging from a sub-tropical island paradise to a snowy ski haven. These diverse planets can be funded directly by separate Terran states or nations and then the required terrain is assembled using comets and various asteroids for the material._

***-EH-***

_Modern Geneering and the Implications of the Past Geneering, Science Now_ Published April 2071

_The development over the past century of advanced nanobots and the application of these nanobots on the human genome for star flight is even more telling after several generations of the use. Humanity has changed from our original baseline to a new offshoot of humanity, now known as _homo terranus_. The changes made include adaptations to our musculoskeletal system and our pulmonary system to better suit a space traveler to survive the adverse conditions in zero gravity. These adaptions included another chamber on the heart to provide better blood flow through the uprated myriad of veins and capillaries of the cardio-pulmonary system. Stronger lungs that can hold more oxygen and the addition of filtering nanobots to the breathing passages to filter out harmful gases and increased oxygen production for low oxygen environments changed where humanity could exist safely. The strengthening of the internal barriers around the organs allowed for higher G-loads than ever before._

_Even with these changes to human physiology, the changes in science made them almost a moot point. The greater knowledge of gravitics and humanity's growing mastery over gravity has made many of these adaptations superfluous, especially the adaptions to better withstand zero gravity. The presence of full gravity on all Terran spacecraft and the ability to completely terraform worlds has made the new abilities unneeded aside from a small part of the species._

_The widespread nature of the initial geneering to everyone who could afford it and later as part of government programs for the first colonists has made it almost unknown to have some individual who does not have some form of nanobots in their blood or enhanced organ capability. These enhancements have extended the lifespan of humanity well beyond even the best estimates of the 20__th__ century. It is not unknown for a healthy person (man or woman, no distinction between either sex) to live up to their second century._

_While it is possible to live for such greater lifespans, the problem is that human body still is dying due to entropy's effect on our lives. The presence of free radicals causes our bodies to slowly wither and die and even the presence of nanobots can do little to stop this decline. While theoretically possible to live into their second or even for those who are a more robust specimen (or one with more enriched nanobots) to live into their third century, it is not without many difficulties for them to survive to this point in time. _

_The presence of extreme factors can cause life to break down quicker. The best example would be on the more human safe biospheres that have been colonized. Unlike the Inside-out Worlds, these worlds are colonized using a much slower process. Even with automated machinery, many of these colonists still have to a good deal of "hands-on" work and the risk of death or dismemberment remains high. It should be noted that Terra remains the bastion of those humans who are approaching their second century and a few who are near their third, but this is only the case due to the better medical treatment available on Terra for her citizens._

_The one segment of the populace who continues to enjoy the benefits of the robust geneering of the early 20__th__ century is the military. Regularly expected to deal with high G loads in combat, the geneering of previous generations is borne out by those combat troops who have to regularly endure it, most notable the fighter corps. The high G loads experienced by a fighter pilot is easily mitigated by the increased nanobot production found in their bone marrow. These nanobots are able to reinforce the pilot's musculature during high G maneuvers, even those that are not dampened out by inertial compensators, and to stimulate the cardio- pulmonary system to provide ample oxygen and blood flow during these maneuvers. Other applications of these bone marrow produced nanobots are still in the works, but for a captured aircrew, they could be a life saver (literally if some of the applications work out)._

***-EH-***

_Artificial Wombs and Their Implications for Humanity_, Op-Ed, Toronto Star August 2071

_While so many people have benefitted from the geneering, there is a hidden cost that isn't mentioned in all of the literature being published. Why do we need this geneering and what purpose is it for? I know of the Kirishiacs, honestly who hasn't heard of them lately, but what is their end goal? What plans do they have for humanity to fulfill? They were trapped here in our solar system, which means someone more powerful than them or an opponent who is of equal power, but took them by surprise. Are we to take up their banner to defend them and the rest of humanity from these enemies?_

_Is this why artificial wombs are being used to inflate Terra's population? Why do we need so many colony worlds? While I do not support the number of children being born or the geneering being done on them, they at least are being taken care of by the government and placed with loving families. Unlike the old stories like _Oliver Twist_ or others like it, these children have not been placed in work houses or homes that are abusive. It seems rather odd that families are given full support to have large families and the artificial wombs are being used along with them._

_What is the end goal here? Are we to become a warrior caste that answers to an alien power? Are we being bred to die for an alien species that does not have our best interests in mind? Only the Kirishiacs can tell us these answers and I, for one, do not see this happening any time soon._

***-EH-***

Excerpt from _Early Military History of the Terran Hegemony_, Sandhurst Publishing 2075

_Following the short conflict with the Koulani, the development of a more powerful set of warships were put in place due to the after action report by Commodore Harold Desmond (who later became commander of the Hegemony Research and Development Command). The _Tyche_ was a very well-liked design and used heavily by the HAF (Hegemony Armed Forces) Navy. The smaller _Oracle_ corvettes were a dangerous close-in support craft, but relied too much on their coilgun armament and as a result were tied to the HAF's supply chain very closely. The development of a new Destroyer sized vessel was needed. The Boeing/BAE Consortium was able to win the contract by developing their revolutionary _Epimetheus_ class destroyer. The _Epimetheus_ made use of the antigraviton cannons featured on the _Tyche,_ but also had a number of missile systems and a faster tactical maneuvering capability than the smaller _Oracle_._

_With development of these two ships finalized, the Terran Hegemony was soon plunged into another war against a hostile alien species, this time the Ch'Lonas. A close neighbor to the Koulani, the Ch'Lonas was seen frequenting Koulani space while the HAF had the system under a blockade. Featuring ships similar in design to the Koulani, the Ch'Lonas were a far more aggressive species. Hemmed into their own star system for centuries by a larger power (later found out to be the Centauri), the Ch'Lonas were first encountered when they attacked the Terran colony on Ross 128 IV._

_Unlike the Koulani attack on 61 Cygnus A II, the Ch'Lonas attack on Ross 128 IV was far more vicious. Not only were the ships in orbit destroyed, older _Tethys_ patrol craft, but the colony was completely razed and the world rendered uninhabitable by the Ch'Lonas fleet. As aid convoys, escorted by the HAF Navy, attempted to visit the stricken world they were attacked by Ch'Lonas fleet elements in fast hit-and-run attacks. Even merchant shipping in Terran systems was not immune to these attacks. How the Ch'Lonas was able to determine where Terrans worlds were located was a mystery to many in the HAF Navy._

_The answer for the HAF came in disguising a force of the new _Epimetheus_ destroyers as cargo for a series of Quantium-40 transporters. While the mineral was not useful for the Terran Hegemony, the discovery that the Jump Gates seeded around Hegemony space and that many races made use of the mineral made it a valuable commodity when the Terran Hegemony became known to the galaxy. The larger transporters are truly massive spacecraft and contained within each of their massive two kilometer hulls numerous bays for holding the important metal. With hidden _Epimetheus_ destroyers in each of their side bays and with other ships (most notably _Tethys _and _Oracles_) as escort, the fleet was predictably ambushed by the Ch'Lonas._

_As the _Epimetheus_ exited each of the large ore carriers, they launched a salvo of gravitic pulse missiles and followed that up with a series of shots from their secondary antigraviton cannons. This unexpected salvo of shots caused heavy damage among the raiding Ch'Lonas ships. Escaping behind a jump point, they unwittingly gave their position away to HAF Navy ships hiding out in hyperspace that then followed them back to their hidden base. With this location now known, the Ch'Lonas' raiding elements were quickly defeated by the HAF Navy._

_A series of follow on strikes were supported by the HAF Admiralty, but they were vetoed when the Hegemony Senate decided that the enemy had been beaten. Lead by the Social Democrats, the Senate restricted combat to within the Hegemony's borders. With peace there was no need for such a massive Navy. Even though the HAF's investigators did not find out how the Ch'Lonas was able to find Terran worlds, the Navy's budget was slashed in favor of expanded social programs and further colonization efforts. While the _Epimetheus_ was an excellent design, production was slashed for these polyvalent ships. Those few ships still in use were retained after the Navy had sympathetic Senators mention that the cost of dry docking these new ships would be exorbitant and would have to come out of the new colonization budget since the Navy would not have the funds for it. A minimal number of _Epimetheus_ and _Tyche_ hulls were retained through the effort of the Senate Hawks, but these ships were minimally staffed and not equipped with a full complement of fighters or missile bays._

_With the funding for HAF Navy ships reduced to barely enough to make ends meet, it is ironic that the other services had different budget cuts of their own. The development of a dedicated ship for the HAF Marine Corps' CAAN (Cavalry Armor Aerospace Naval) contingents was slashed as well and they had to make do with a modified _Tyche_ to support their operations. While the HAF Army could use HAF Navy ships or in a pinch Marine ship to transport their forces into combat, their proposal for their own armed transports was soundly turned down by the Terran Senate. Other military factors that led to this down turn are the military's own successes against both the Koulani and the Ch'Lonas. While neither alien species is a "bottom" tier military, nor are they a "top" tier opponent. This success has led many to question the value of a powerful military and to support a more neutral outlook and an expansionist move towards more colonization._

_The biggest opponents to the expansionist outlook are the HAF itself. Stretched thin by the budget cuts and the freeze on building new hulls, they lack the patrol ships necessary to support operations by the Explorer Division. The small _Oracle _hulls have been slowly modified removing their larger coilguns and using the space to host a quartet of shuttles for exploration teams. Some of the older _Tyche_ hulls (generally the Alpha and a few of the older Betas) have also been heavily modified to act as the escort for Explorer groups. The increased bays allow for a greater number of shuttles and the dropships to ferry down supplies to newly found worlds for Inside-out conversion. The plan to decrease the dependence on the Navy to provide protection for newly colonized worlds was to place satellite defenses (leaving off the accepted military lessons of multiple centuries that fixed defenses are not fallible) around each world. A few of the smaller modified _Oracles_ would be placed around each world as well to provide further protection. _

_No longer will the HAF Navy be sent out to patrol the borders of the Hegemony as they usually had done. Mothballs were ordered and placed around Jupiter in the Sol System and around New Earth in the Tau Ceti system. Smaller shipyards have been placed around a number of the Ring Worlds, those worlds that directly border the Sol system who feature the largest number of the Inside-out Worlds in the Terran Hegemony. These shipyards are barely able to handle maintenance on those few ships remaining in the HAF Navy or those ships seconded to the Explorer Division. As maintenance contracts dwindled, so too did the economies around these worlds. An unintentional effect of the Social Democrats policies following conflicts with the Koulani and Ch'Lonas led to an economic downturn as the Terran economy shifted to colonization and much of the available capital was being used to create more colonies for the massive number of citizens in the Sol system._

***-EH-***

**AN1:** I went with Top Gear as I enjoy the show, but my wife didn't care for the fact that it was cars/motoring only. I can see the series doing another reboot and they start to include more than just cars, especially with all of the antigravity systems that have just come out around the world.

**AN2:** Picking out new worlds to colonize is rather difficult. Making it even more difficult is that almost all of the worlds that the EA had as colonies are currently occupied by the Centauri. By moving up the development of colonies by close to 150 years, I've had to change some of the first colony worlds and importance around a bit. Some people may realize that some of the concepts for worlds and the name of the government are from CBT (that is somewhat intentional). That's mostly due to my own knowledge of the CBT universe (something close to over 20 years of playing the game) and there are plenty of resources for world names and their distance from Terra. To add in another wrinkle to things, the more advanced sensors and jump drive used by the Hegemony allows them to colonize worlds that the OTL EA never could. Mostly those worlds with stronger than normal gravity sources, i.e. binary and trinary star systems and those with dwarf stars in them.


	7. Second Contact

**Chapter 6 Second Contact**

As humanity moved through the paces of full scale colonization, they remained blissfully unaware of the greater dangers of the rest of the galaxy. It was just prior to this idyllic time that they met two hostile alien species. The mysterious Koulani and Ch'Lonas both prosecuted a military campaign against Terra's defenders, the HAF Navy. After negotiating a peace treaty with the Koulani, their attacks ceased and a loose trading alliance sprang up between the closest Terran colonies to their space, specifically 61 Cygnus A II. The lack of definitive contact with the Ch'Lonas proved to be troubling for some in the HAF High Command, but the lack of available ships kept the fleet from investigating. Even the original Jump Gate located around Ch'Lon had gone offline. Without the funding for new ships, the HAF Navy languished without a true mission. Those few ships that were crewed counted themselves fortunate that they had not been completely disbanded by a Senate taken in by peace.

While the peaceful period following the end of the wars against both the Koulani and the Ch'Lonas were bad for the HAF Military, the Explorer Division experienced boom times. With their budget increased in size larger than before, the Explorer Division was able to move further away from Terra with their colonization effort. Expanding out further than before the number of Inside-out Worlds increased by four-fold with every star system regardless of star type being colonized by the Explorer Division. Eschewing "conventional" wisdom, the Explorer Division chose these stars more for their position around Terra rather than relying on the abundance of natural resources. Each of these newly colonized systems were to be used to hold the large number of colonists who were moving away from the Sol system and the inhabited planets there.

This outward push of course had to be moderated by selecting systems that did not already possess Jump Gates in them. Considering the jump method used by the Hegemony's ships it came as no surprise that the market for fresh emitters and the production of them became a quick method for a newly colonized world to earn enough money to buy out their contract. The use of the mass reducer/concentrator allowed each of these colonized worlds to create their own materials through the use of gravitics and could supply them with the technology they wanted without the need for additional (and expensive) shipments from outside. The problem some of these worlds developed was that there was a dearth of raw materials in many of these systems to support the kind of economies and therefore the same standard of living as seen on Terra and the Ring Worlds. Since each of these newly colonized worlds was colonized "simply because they could be," the Explorer Division did not take this into account. The situation would turn towards the worse before it got better for some of the later colonization efforts.

The push for better worlds and the lack of additional funds from a recalcitrant Senate caused the Explorer Division to branch out further and push into systems that had a Jump Gate present. These systems it was theorized had already had their biosphere modified for sentient life and would not take as much money to bring to the Terran standard. Even though so many of the Terran citizens had some form of geneering and could survive on worlds less than ideal from the Terran standard; many preferred to have the same kind of lush world that their ancestors enjoyed. It was because of this reason that the world known as Vega was settled by Terran settlers. It retained a Jump Gate in orbit, but the world itself was close enough to the Terran standard that the early settlers had no trouble settling in on the world. As per recent decrees from the Explorer Division and supported by the Senate, the only defensive measures taken was the placement of several defense satellites in orbit of Vega's only habitable world and the placement of a single _Oracle_, the _THS Yangtze_, as an in-system defense craft. Luckily for Vega's inhabitants, the _Yangtze_ remained a full strength corvette and not one of the Explorer Division variants. Two of the larger solid planets in the outer system were slowly turned into Inside-out Worlds to give the system a bit more variety and for a wider population base than the sole world.

***-EH-***

**Vega system  
****Terran Hegemony/Centauri space  
****July 2106**

With a burst of light a blue funnel opened from hyperspace and a _Talvan_ class cruiser, the _Pride of Refa_ exited from the Jump Gate into normal space. The ship registered under House Refa, was exploring outside the currently held borders of Centauri space. Radio signals had been discovered in this system and intrigued the captain ordered his ship to the system to investigate. Upon arriving there through the Centauri-owned Jump Gate, he noticed that the system had changed from the last Imperial records. A series of small satellites now orbited the world and there were even a few near the Jump Gate. His orders were clear from his House Leaders; he was to find any new resources to continue the expansion of his House. Failing that, he was to find other alien species that his House could exploit to bring more prominence to his House. Even with the Centauri's defeat of the Orieni, they were slowly contracting their space due to societal concerns. This space had once been the Centauri's and now it appeared that another race had taken up on the world.

House Captain Jens Refa, a third son of the Noble House, knew his orders and was expected to follow them to the letter. However, he coveted glory for himself. He was the third son and at most was expected to take a minor role in his House. Instead he went away to join the House Navy thanks to the stories told about their noble exploits supporting the Emperor during the war with Orieni. These sugar coated tellings instilled in him a sense of camaraderie with the noble fleets and made him want to follow in their intrepid footsteps. His own ship was a remnant of that war and was well maintained by the House's technicians. As he laid eyes on the system, he only saw the glory for his House and moved towards the Tactical station on the bridge to learn more about the system.

His ship had been upgraded slightly since the war had ended, but House Captain Refa was certain that he could handle anything this minor race had to offer. Giving orders for his ship to move closer to the colony, the sensors began to pick up a small ship in the inner system near the colony world. A series of radio signals were sent from the unknown ship, but the language was not in the ship's database. A quick scan showed some impressive ECM fields, but the more powerful sensors on his ship quickly cut through them. Picking up the signatures for Gauss weaponry, the first thought was that the Orieni had cut through Minbari space and moved towards the other side of the Centauri and developed a new colony world. The lack of spacestations or Hunter Killer craft seemed to show that thought as false. Filing away the odd choice of armament, his ship fired off the nose mounted Assault Laser to open up combat with the smaller ship.

Surprised to find that one of the more powerful weaponry in the Centauri armament portfolio was less than effective, the _Pride of Refa_ began to close to where all of the weapons could be brought to bear. Streams of solid projectiles began to strike his larger ship as the smaller ship began to fire their Gauss weaponry. Return fire from his light particle beams were intercepted before they came close enough to strike the smaller ship. Only the larger Assault Lasers on his ship could do any damage to the small ship. As the _Pride of Refa_ closed towards the small ships, the defensive satellites began firing streams of projectiles at his ship again from what he considered to be Gauss weaponry as well. They were larger than anything the small ship possessed, but he was able to move away from the satellites due to their fixed positions.

Bringing the massive plasma cannons to bear on the smaller ship, House Captain Refa was supremely surprised to see the ship fire something at each of the plasma bolts heading towards the small ship. As the streams of what appeared to be particle fire hit each of the bolts, the bolts lost complete cohesion and ceased to be. Surprised at the accuracy of the small shots, he was brought back to attention as the right sponson of his ship was shredded by a hail of accurate Gauss fire. With the plasma cannon there knocked out, the order was given for damage control parties to plug the leaks and for the Assault Lasers to be fired continuously at the smaller ship. Eventually the Gauss fire seemed to taper off, aside from a light salvo from a pair of guns that fired towards the right rear of the small ship. House Captain Refa could only watch as the small ship opened a jump point and escaped before he could order the ship destroyed.

Surprised that the small ship was capable of opening a jump point, House Captain Refa's attention was drawn to the defensive satellites. Ordering them destroyed, he went back to review reports from the damage control parties. The hull had been damaged heavily, but was repairable by onboard supplies. As the last of the defense satellites over the world exploded, the _Pride of Refa_ moved closer to the world of Vega. A series of messages were being sent to his craft using a variety of transmission types; radio, tachyon, and microwave they demanded the same thing: why he chose to attack a peaceful world. Incensed at what he termed to be insubordination by the people on the world below, all messages were ignored and his remaining Assault Lasers were brought to the fore to bombard the surface of the world below.

Targeting the colony's buildings, the main city of New Hope was devastated by the number of particle weapon strikes from orbit. The only silver lining to an otherwise bad day was that the majority of the colony's inhabitants had made their way to the shelters outside the city. The rest of the city was not so fortunate and the particle beams rained down on the side for close to an hour. After the beams had been used on the city, the fields outside the city were next to feel the destruction wrought by the vengeful Centauri warship. Plasma fire as well was added to the carnage and the fields began to burn and pretty soon the fires had spread to the majority of the continent that New Hope resided upon. Nearly pristine forests and the few open areas cleared out for the city went up in smoke as the fires spread and ash hung in the atmosphere of Vega for quite some time.

Satisfied with his handiwork, House Captain Refa took some time to finalize the repairs on his ship. Using this time to do some "constructive" work, the Captain ordered his troops to take the pair of shuttles down to the planet to see if anything was salvageable or if there were survivors who could be captured and taken back to his House's enclave. A pair of the weapon satellites was also taken somewhat intact and could yield more clues about the Orieni-like weaponry used against them.

Towards the third day, the House Refa troops had combed through the ruined township of New Hope and found little in the way of salvageable equipment or survivors. A fortuitous discovery of the tunnels leading away from the city almost led them straight to the colony's survivors, but with so little remaining it was left until further troops could be attained from House Command. This lack of action would save the lives of the colonists who had fled previously. Taking what little they could find, the Jump Gate was opened once more and the _Pride of Refa_ transited into hyperspace for the voyage back home. A quick message was sent to House Command, but the details remained sketchy (intentionally so on the orders of Jens Refa). House Command would find out about the aliens who decided to inhabit one of their old systems. Further plans were drawn up in case other former Centauri worlds were under the control of these aliens. These plans would have far more repercussions than were originally envisioned by their creators.

***-EH-***

_**Yangtze **_**Captain's log**

Following the opening of the Jump Gate into the Vega system, we noticed a large ship that passed through the opening. Without any verifiable identification on the ship, we sent over a hail for identification from them. In return, we received an identification sweep from the enemy ship that cut through our ECM field. Then the mystery ship opened fire with an incredibly powerful particle beam that our newly installed interceptor grid barely managed to deflect away from us. The large ship kept moving towards us and we eventually managed to bring our coilgun armament to bear on it. The light set did some damage, but it seemed to bounce off the hull of the enemy ship. Our larger dorsal and ventral coilgun mounts should be able to damage them, but our minimal ammo load keeps them from being useful for a ranging series of shots. That left us with only the light coilguns for that purpose.

The ship fired a series of light particle shots as well that were easily intercepted and did no damage to us. They closed quickly with us and added in a pair of larger plasma cannons that also were intercepted. Withholding fire from our main coilgun mounts gave us few opportunities to give the enemy back more than what we've received from them. The larger ship was fast enough to keep up with us, but our acceleration and maneuverability was slightly higher than it. Another rapid strike tore through the port housing when a triple strike from the enemy ship made its way through our Interceptors. We did close enough to bring our medium coilguns to bear and a quick Alpha Strike blasted off the starboard sponson of the enemy ship. Unfortunately that strike also depleted the meager ammunition supply for them as well.

With little to no ammo left and the defense satellites all but useless against the enemy ship, I made a tough decision to flee to the closest fleet command base to let them know about the dangers of this new enemy. We were able to power forward using the remaining forward light coilgun on the starboard mounting and the aft starboard mounting to catch the enemy in a bit of an enfilade scheme while we made our way outside the gravity well. Once outside, we initiated a jump into hyperspace and made our way to the Fleet base outside the Ring Worlds. The navigator estimates that with the damage to the forward port hull, the trip will take close to two days. We can quicken our journey if we stop and allow the auto-repair features on our ship to repair the hull, but that will only take off about twelve hours from our journey.

I just hope that Fleet Command is willing to listen to us and release more ships to head out here. The defensive satellites were a poor defense mechanism as they had too little penetrating power, especially with the light coilguns on board. The chronic lack of spare parts and supplies for missiles also meant that the defensive satellites couldn't do their job either.

End of log.

***-EH-***

The implications of there being hostile alien life that was also fairly well off technologically came as a shock to the Terran Hegemony as a whole. Overnight the Senate was hit with a number of complaints as the various constituents of border worlds leaned on their Senators and demanded upgraded protections for their worlds. So many requested this upgrade that it quickly became known in the news media and the resulting scandal rocked the Terran Senate as it was later determined that several of the Social Democrats had received compensation from the manufacturer for the defense satellites that were so poorly used to defend Terran worlds.

As the Hegemony began to recall previous crews back to their positions and to bring ships out of mothballs, word reached the Senate of another two worlds that had been struck by the same attackers. In each case it was worlds that all had Jump Gates nearby that resulted in the attackers coming through the gates. The only good news to be found in the disasters was that the emergency planning had worked on all but one of the colonies. The colony at Orion was caught completely unaware due to maintenance being done on several of the sensor platforms. The enemy was able to attack and destroy all of the defense satellites in orbit and made off with almost half of the colonists as prisoners.

As the previous administration was worked over the coals by the press, the HAF High Command began to route more of the funding that had gone to the Explorer Division and some questionable social programs back into the coffers for the Navy. Restoration work began as soon as ships started to come out of the mothball fleets. A triage setup was created whereby the youngest ships and those with the least degradation were outfitted for combat operations first. Those ships that required the most work were instead taken apart to provide spare parts and functioning weaponry for other ships that were in a better state of repair.

The next hurdle that hit was that too few of the shipyards had the yard space and even the massive _Babylon_ _Station_ in Terran orbit did not have the repair bays to support operations of this level and intensity. Work was delayed as more equipment was fabricated for the automated shipyards and more workers were brought in from civilian companies to bring the automated shipyards back to full strength to handle the large number of ships that needed to be readied for the Navy. The Ring Worlds with their artificial nature were well suited to the demands and their shipyards were among the first to go to full operational status.

All across the Hegemony, worlds scrambled to move towards a war time economy. Even though the newest worlds were only first stage colonies, the people there were Terran citizens and a large number of volunteers began to flood HAF recruiting stations. With plenty of new recruits and more able-bodied volunteers, the training groups began an accelerated course to get their recruits trained with the skills that they needed to effectively crew the HAF ships. The extensive geneering of previous years aided this process greatly. Specialized nanobots were programmed with the course material and each recruit was injected with them. The nanobots traveled to each recruits brains and imprinted the course material directly to their cortex. All it took was the development of muscle memory and the application of the directed knowledge and training course times were slashed in half by the unique process of using nanobots.

***-EH-***

**Orion Colony  
****Terran/Centauri space  
****August 2106**

The Jump Gate flared into life as a series of Centauri ships came through the gate. Formed from a phalanx under the control of House Refa, the fleet was led by House Captain Jens Refa aboard his _Pride of Refa_ and consisted of three more _Talvan_ cruisers and a single _Kendari_ scout ship. The presence of the _Kendari_ was to document the colony world's defenses and that the ship could also carry a flight of light weight _Glaive_ fighters to support the shuttle craft carried by the cruisers. The small bit of salvage taken from the city of New Hope on Vega gave a unique bit of insight into these alien colonists. The crystal media found had been examined and a number of what appeared to be historical broadcasts were found on them. The name of the city was matched to one of these broadcasts and the appearance of large wedge-shaped warships that featured an armament greater than even a _Centaurum_ Battleship caused a great deal of panic to erupt among those watching the broadcast. The large battlestation evoked the larger stations that were in use during the previous war with the Orieni and the revealed flaw of an exhaust port that a small fighter could exploit heartened the Centauri viewing the broadcast.

The biggest revelation was that the historical broadcasts all showed that the figures were very Centauri-like. Not quite Centauri, but they could easily be a sub-species lost in time. The males did not wear their hair the same way and aside from a few in the broadcasts, they tended towards shorter hair (though with large beards). The females all retained their hair as well, but had figures not unlike Centauri women. A number of occupation troops had been pulled together to see if they could acquire captives from one of the colonies that they had been finding lately.

All too many of the colonies had the same pitiful defense satellites that were easily destroyed from a distance, though the colonists could not be found. It was presumed that these Terrans, as the broadcasts had been translated slightly, had an escape plan in place of eminent invasion and so many of them fled once the defense satellites opened fire on the Centauri ships. Taking their pleasure from looting the worlds and finding some rather good wines, but nothing else of interest, the Centauri troops indulged in target practice on the worlds that they had found.

It wasn't until the next jump into the territory near Quadrant 16 did the House Refa Fleet find another colony world. The world had until a few decades ago been a Centauri holding, but the societal shocks following the Orieni War had caused it to be abandoned. Finding the world as so many others now used by the Terrans, the House Refa Fleet was surprised to find that there were no defense satellites in orbit. The only orbital traffic was a pair of small ships that appeared to be freighters that were in orbit over the world. The few ships there in orbit were quickly dispatched by the _Glaive_ fighters carried by the _Kendari_. A wave of shuttles quickly made their way down to the surface escorted by the fighters. As the Centauri ships overflew fields and small houses, they noticed that there were a number of Terrans out and about instead of being in the emergency shelters.

Touching down quickly, the ad-hoc troops from House Refa took to stunning their victims and loading them up into the shuttles from farmstead to farmstead. Only after a child made their way into town was the alarm raised about the invaders. A pitched battle began to take place between those townspeople who were armed with hunting weaponry against the Centauri troops. Lacking the armor that the Royal units would normally be equipped with, the House Refa troopers had little to no defenses against the light coilguns and particle guns carried by the colonists. Surprised at the defense being mounted against them, a flight of _Glaives_ was called in to provide suppressing fire against the colonists and the rest of the House Refa troops retreated to their shuttles. However, they left behind over twenty of their own as they attempted to escape.

In response to the perceived insult, House Captain Refa ordered his ships to open fire on the colony and to "burn them all." Plasma weaponry along with Assault Lasers were used to destroy much of the colony and resulted in the largest number of casualties to date from the attacks by House Refa. As the attacks streamed down to the colony below, the surviving troops along with the captured civilians were brought onboard the House Refa ships. With a final salvo, the quintet ships turned around and headed to the Jump Gate. A flash of light later an orange and red vortex opened and they were through and on their way back to Centauri space.

***-EH-***

_Politics Now!_ Online News Network August 2106

_Following a series of attacks on our coreward border, a mysterious enemy has attacked several of our newest colony worlds. The only commonality with each of these worlds is that they are all newly settled and in each system is a Jump Gate. It is speculated that these worlds were previously owned, but later abandoned by the same power that has attacked our colonies. The recent pillage and capture of several dozen civilians from the Orion colony has the Terran Senate on the defensive. As has been reported previously, the Terran Senate had cut back military spending to focus on exploration and social programs. As the growing losses are mounting among those sent to defend the outer planets, the threat of a complete collapse in the government is eminent._

***-EH-***

_News Hour with Jim Mitchells_ Terran Broadcast Company August 2106

_There have been a number of speculations today that we could see a complete shakeup in the Terran Senate in the coming weeks. The Social Democrats have lost a number of seats to recall elections in their districts and the Hawk party seems to be at the forefront of many voters' minds. Those who can recall the situation remember how the Hawk party pushed for increased spending for the military following the conflicts with both the Koulani and the Ch'Lonas not too long ago. Instead, the Terran Senate backed a series of plans where the monies that would have gone to the HAF Navy instead went to the Explorer Division and to a single conglomeration that marketed a series of defense satellites. Instead of putting the larger Orbital Platforms around the colony worlds, like here in the Ring Worlds or the Sol system, the smaller point defense satellites were used instead. The effectiveness of these smaller satellites was questioned often enough and the critics have been borne out in their criticism given the dismal combat record against the invaders._

_The loss of colonists on Orion has made the political position even worse in the Terran Senate and it is highly likely that a vote for War is expected from the Senate any day now. The recovery of bodies following the razing of the colony on Orion has hardened the hearts and minds of many on the Senate. Even the discovery of the alien life forms, referred to as the Centauri has done little to assuage the coming conflict. The only sticking point for the Hawk party and others that are supporting war is that the HAF Navy is in poor shape following nearly two decades of neglect._

_The recent sighting of the THS _Yangtze_ has fueled speculation further that the enemy can be beaten; if the external appearance of the corvette is anything to go by, the war will be difficult. The Centauri are an unknown race to us, but according to star charts and long range sensor sweeps by ELINT ships of the HAF Navy, a number of possible targets have been found. _

_We take you now live to the bridge of the THS _Alexander,_ the flagship of Task Force 12. Viewers will notice that the intrepid Commodore Harold Desmond is once again in command of the Task Force. Composed of the first ships that have been refitted the first target for the fleet is the suspected Centauri world at Baruwan slightly deeper into the enemy's home space._

**AN:** The ships mentioned are all canon designs (aside from the armament of the Terran Navy vessels) and can be found from numerous resources. The _Tyche_ and _Epimetheus_ are both the original jump capable ships produced by the EA in the OTL. In fact the _Tyche_ is the basis for the later _Hyperion_. The Centauri ships are mostly older vessels found in the _Wars of the Centauri Republic_ supplement for AoG's B5 Wars.

**AN2:** I do plan on posting up a number of ship designs in their own Technical Readout or Field Manual (a la CBT style) for a later posting with full ship stats like on the EFNI site.


	8. War Time Blues

**Preliminary AN: **Thank you to everyone for the reviews and the favorites. This story is certainly fun to write and I hope everyone has enjoyed reading it as well. Without further ado... on with the story!

**Chapter 7 War Time Blues**

**Baruwon  
Centauri Republic**

An isolated outpost away from the borders of most of the hostile races opposed to the Centauri, Baruwon had little in the way of defenders. A few spacestations in orbit near the planet and scattered destroyers, the planet was little more than a scientific outpost and agricultural colony world. This all changed when numerous jump points erupted in blue fire and oddly shaped ships came through and began to fire on the colony's defenders. A mixture of pulsed particle cannon fire along with streams of solid projectiles rained down on the enemy defenders. Combined with gravitic weaponry fired by the _Tyches_, the HAF fleet quickly overwhelmed the defenders in the system. A series of shuttle craft supported by the dependable _Flying Fox_ fighters streamed out to each station to capture them. Strategic bombardment by gravitic weapons quickly silenced those few weapons on the Centauri stations in orbit.

Scattered reports of fighting were heard over the marine unit's communication systems as the Marines made their way deeper into each spacestation. The powered armor worn by the Marines quickly over powered the few Centauri Marines present and soon enough all three of the spacestations were in Terran hands. The highest ranking official was a member of House Jaddo, a merchant leader of the house by the name of Descartes Jaddo. The shock seeing a Centauri-like alien species that he had never heard of was evident on his face. He officially decried the desecration and when confronted with the evidence of previous Centauri aggression, his curses became louder still.

"Yes, yes I recognize the ships that attacked you. They are from House Refa's Home Fleet. I recognize those markings on their hull."

"Why did they attack our colonies?" was the reply from the Hegemony interrogation specialist.

"More than likely you were an easy enough target for the _Illustrious_ House Refa to engage in battle" the scorn was very evident in his voice. "You were little more than a roadblock on their way to greatness or some such garbage."

The "interview" went along quickly with the House Jaddo representative willing to let the fleet officers know enough information about the rival Merchant House. The only information that was not related was Centauri military bases or the location of their homeworld. Esoteric information was also passed along about the disparate politically maneuvering that had erupted following the Republic's war with another technologically advanced race. The stagnation was evident given the trappings on the station looked worn and ill-fitting. Descartes Jaddo even admitted that his House was planning on abandoning the world since the crop land was so poor and the location was far enough removed from the House's main holdings that it was almost untenable. Several hours of testimony were little more than pining for the lost glories of his House and for the Republic as a whole.

Militarily buoyed by the seemingly easy victory and possessing locations of several worlds nearby that were purported to be the holdings of House Refa, Task Force 12 began the process of gathering all of the squadrons for a jump into hyperspace. The colony at Baruwon was left alone and the Centauri spacestations in orbit were unmolested as well in a show of good faith with House Jaddo. The most common comment uttered when a bottle of Riesling had been passed around to "celebrate" the passing of the Terran fleet was that it was "passable, but not quite up to the standards of Bravari."

***-EH-***

_A Historical Note on HAF Navy Designations_ Sandhurst Academy Press 2146

_The force structure of the HAF as a whole has confounded many observers and is a point of contention between the various services that are a part of the HAF, i.e. Army, Marine Corps, or Navy. The force structure came about through several decades, if not a century, of trial-and-error and combat against several alien races._

_The HAF Navy makes use of an over-arching fleet structure that encompasses Commands, Task Forces, Fleets, and Squadrons. Squadrons are the smallest building block of any Fleet and can be composed of a myriad of forces, though most of the time it is known as the smallest mutually supporting formation. Many of the Squadrons of later years have been built around the Carrier Group, a lesson learned during the War with the Centauri, and are known to encompass a Carrier and its escorting Cruisers and Destroyers. It is not unknown for Destroyer Squadrons to be formed that contain a full Fighter Squadron and the unit as a whole focuses on training together in combat and drills. It was during the Centauri War that Destroyer Squadrons came into their own and were built around the older _Epimetheus_ hulls. Squadrons are usually commanded by Commanders, but some smaller groupings (usually corvettes and patrol craft) may be commanded by Lieutenants._

_Fleets are routinely, but not always, composed of three Squadrons. There are some formations, especially on the Periphery regions of Hegemony space, which include more than three Squadrons of ships and could have as many as six or seven Squadrons. Usually built around the use of Fighters, Fleets routinely contain anywhere from a single Fighter Wing up to a full Group. In most non-combat situations, Fleets are usually an administrative grouping of forces. Indeed many Fleets have been known to have their elements scattered across a number of worlds providing garrison forces, but grouped together only for the purposes of resupply requests. Fleets are usually commanded by Captains, though for smaller groups a single Commander may be in command if the Fleet is composed of destroyers or smaller ships._

_The next larger formation is the Task Force. Task Forces usually are composed of a grouping of Fleets and are only really used if a larger force is necessary, most notably during the conflict with the Ch'Lonas and later against the Centauri. The best example is the famous Task Force 12 that was made up of Fleet 1 and Fleet 2 from the HAF Navy. The heavier Fleet 1 was made up primarily of _Tyche_ cruisers with a few _Epimetheus_ destroyers for support and the lighter Fleet 2 was made up of an almost equal mix of _Epimetheus_ destroyers and _Oracle_ corvettes. The two Fleets together formed a powerful Task Force that could respond to a myriad of situations and in the case of the Centauri War, did so many times. Task Forces are unheard of during peace time and are only formed when needed by the Admiralty. Task Forces are nominally commanded by Captains who have been breveted to the rank of Commodore. In some cases, the rank is an actual promotion for those Captains who have distinguished themselves in combat leading Task Forces._

_The final grouping is the Command or sometimes called Sector Command. Commands are usually made up of multiple Fleets and are the main administrative and command elements for a set area of space. The most common Commands are the Core Command, made up of the Sol System and the Ring Worlds; the Periphery Command, made up of the outer planets spinward from Sol; the "Eastern" Command, those worlds to the galactic "east" of Sol; the League Command, those systems bordering the League of Non-Aligned Worlds; and the Centauri Command, worlds that border the conflict zone between the Narn and Centauri. Control over these Commands is in the hands of an Admiral who has full authority of this sector of space. _

_The exceptions to this formation structure are those naval ships assigned to the Marine Corps that are a part of their Cavalry Armor Aerospace Naval (CAAN) structure. These formations use their own guidelines and are not usually under the command of a Sector Command. Merchant traffic and Task Forces also fall outside the command responsibilities of each individual Sector Command and are not counted towards the forces within a set Sector._

***-EH-***

**Beta 3  
****House Refa Headquarters  
****Centauri Republic**

Captives taken from the Orion colony were placed into what can only be described as slave pens by their House Refa captors. Composed of farmers and their families, those who had been captured had not made it easy on their captors at all. Interrogations showed for little and pretty soon they became little more than sessions where prisoners were beaten for their insolence. Stubbornly staying quiet to annoy their captors, the humans from the Orion colony could do little to prevent the beatings meted out to them. All along the only thoughts on their minds was the thirst for revenge and for the eventual beat down on the Centauri when the Fleet found their position. The more pragmatic among the captives held little hope for their situation, but did not say anything to undermine morale in an already bad situation.

Their captors were enjoying their tasks quite a bit more. Jens Refa was being praised by the current head of House Refa, his father Renard Refa, something that had never happened before in Jens' life (such was his lot as a third son). Promoted to full command over the House Refa fleet, Jens had little experience to back-up his new rank of House Admiral. The lack of Royal Navy oversight, all previous overseers having been withdrawn following the end of the War with the Orieni, allowed House Refa to build up a number of ships for a renewed push toward the Terrans' home sector of worlds. The most puzzling part was that several of the scout ships had found empty star systems and only a few that appeared to have been used by pirates or bandits. These hidden pirate bases were of course completely destroyed after it was discovered that the Drazi had taken them from the Centauri; leaving off the fact that the Republic had slowly moved away from them at any rate.

Rallying a fleet of close to one hundred ships across all classes, House Refa had an envious fleet from the point of view of some of the smaller Houses, but it did not come close to compare to House Mollari's fleet or the Royal Navy. Aside from the House Command Ship, a _Centaurum_ battleship, the rest of the fleet were composed of older (still just as capable, but without gravitic drives) ships that were old when the Orieni went to war with the Centauri. The _Pride of Refa_ gained a further place of pride as it was put into place as the second highest ship of the fleet behind the flagship and several combat groups were put together. The one glaring fault that many Royal Navy observers had about House Refa's fleet was its reliance on Destroyers and Cruisers and an almost total lack of fighter support. Indeed the only fighters available were the light _Glaive_ class rather than the newer _Sentri_ or the heavier _Phalan_ (or the missile carrying variant) assault fighters.

The concentration of ships was split up into several Battle Groups concentrating firepower on the _Talvans_ and supporting them with numerous small _Navask_ escort destroyers. Self-supporting groups of _Kendari_ scout ships were dispatched forward to search for Terran colonies and to send anything found back to the command fleet with the massive _Fist of Refa_ in command.

***-EH-***

As the scout ships began searching following an arc out from Centauri space, they encountered only abandoned Centauri worlds and a few minor races (carefully noted for later conquest), but nothing of the Terrans. Over the first world, Vega, a scouting fleet of a trio of _Kendaris_ made contact with the forward elements of a Terran Destroyer Squadron. Composed of four _Epimetheus_ destroyers, the Terran ships began launching fighters and accelerated to do battle with the smaller ships. The Centauri fleet launched all of the fighters to counter the Terran move and soon enough the _Glaives_ were in a massive dogfight with the _Flying Foxes,_ with the Centauri fighters having a minor numerical advantage over the Terran ones.

The quartet of Terran destroyers moved into combat positions and their antigraviton cannons began taking a toll on the light weight _Kendaris_ that only could fire their light particle beams in response. The Interceptor Grid on the Terran ships made short work of the Centauri particle beams, but the Centauri had no defense against the gravitic weaponry on the Terran ships. First one, then a second Centauri ship was dispatched with minimal damage done to the _Epimetheus_ destroyers. For the _Flying Foxes_, though they were thoroughly outmatched by the lighter Centauri fighters and the entire Squadron was close to destruction. Two of the _Epimetheus_ destroyers were dispatched on anti-fighter duty and the Centauri fighters were forced to retreat when the accurate pulsed particle fire from the two ships drove them away from the Terran fighters.

The sole surviving _Kendari_ attempted to jump out using the Jump Gate since their own jump drive was not currently online due to battle damage, but was intercepted by the other two Terran destroyers. A distress signal was sent out, but the time needed for House Refa ships to jump in system was considerable and they could not arrive in time to save the last ship. Orders were sent from the Terran Squadron for the final Centauri ship to surrender, which they did less than half an hour into the engagement.

Not every fleet engagement was a victory for the HAF. On several occasions, smaller Fleet groups composed of corvettes supported by a few destroyers were destroyed when confronted with cruiser groups from House Refa. The Interceptor Grid, while deadly could do little against the massed fire from the Assault Lasers on the _Talvans_. The only bright spot in these fleet encounters for the HAF was that the Centauri ships lacked fighter support and their point defense weaponry was underpowered when compared to Terran ships.

As fleet losses began to mount for both sides, the call for better ships to take on the cruisers on both sides became the most urgent factor in the war. Both sides were quick to point that fact out to leaders that it would come down to a large engagement to truly end this conflict before other ships were brought in from either side or other species. Already for House Refa, the Royal Navy and several opposition Houses had noticed the increased fleet movements and questions were being answered that were coming very close to home. For the HAF political pressure was mounting, discounting that poor political reasons brought them to this point in time, and each failed battle was hitting home how poorly the HAF Navy was outfitted after decades of neglect.

The battle lines had been drawn and both sides were hurtling to what was hoped to be a massive conclusion.

***-EH-***

_Interceptor Technology and the Implications on Fleet Tactics_ Sandhurst Academy Publishing 2094

_Following the brief conflict with the Koulani Directorate, the HAF Navy noticed that the primary weapon system being used by the aliens was the directed plasma cannon. A devastating weapon system, albeit with an incredibly short range, the plasma cannon fired plasma held together with magnetic fields. A few intrepid fleet captains had taken to firing their lighter point defense cannons as a last ditch effort against these plasma bursts and the few times a hit was registered, the ships took far less plasma damage. Following the conflict with the Koulani, several of their plasma weapons were taken for close study to determine effective means to block these deadly weapons._

_Research done on the memory cores left by the Kirishiacs and with the aid of the Kirishiac Remnant pointed to the use of gravitic dissipaters (i.e. shields) as the best possible avenue. The lack of available funding and the general lack of understanding by Terran scientists at this time precluded that avenue of research. Instead targeting modules were meshed with the ultra-light particle cannons of the point defense systems on several ships and the software was upgraded to allow these particle cannons to directly target weapons fired at them. Some tweaks were needed as the system was tested against all types of weaponry currently available to the Hegemony._

_Against plasma weaponry and other similar weapons that fire a "bolt" the newly developed Interceptor Grid was highly effective at breaking up the magnetic or gravitic fields holding the bolt together. The now reduced bolt was less effective against the heavy armor on Hegemony ships and in many cases the bolt had disintegrated before it could hit the ship it was aimed at. While equally effective against projectiles, especially missiles, the Interceptor Grid sometimes did not have enough shots fired to be truly effective against multiple projectiles (most notably the lighter Terran coilguns and their contemporaries). Particle weaponry and gravitic weaponry proved to be incredibly difficult to intercept and it was finally decided to integrate a powerful ECM system to make targeting using those systems more difficult._

_The rate of fire issue became less of one once the upgraded ultra-light PPC (Pulsed Particle/Coilgun) system was developed. The rotating arrangement of four of the ultra-light particle guns around the ultra-light 2mm coilgun gave the newly developed Interceptor Grid a much higher rate of fire than before. Indeed the advanced targeting systems made the system even more suitable as a very effective anti-aircraft and anti-missile system in addition to the Interception duties placed on them. The only drawback is that the system has to be "tuned" to a specific duty in order to get the most out of it. It is because of this tuning that many ship captains will set several of the Interceptors to Intercept mode and others for anti-aircraft/missile mode. The other problem that has come up is the cooling jackets have had to be increased in size to accommodate the increased heat caused by the spinning barrels. _

***-EH-***

**Vega  
****Contested Space  
September 21, 2106**

It would begin at Vega and many hoped that it would end there as well. The fleet under House Refa's control began to unite the disparate fleet elements that had been on scouting or strike missions and told to gather at Vega. The HAF's intelligence arm quickly spotted this increased activity thanks to two Inside-out Worlds that were functioning at a reduced capacity following the original Centauri invasion. Task Force 12 was brought together and another Task Force was formed from Fleet 8 and Fleet 16 (forming Task Force 816) from the Periphery Sector Command. It was hoped that the two Task Forces would have enough ships to make a difference against the Centauri. So long as the Centauri deployed the same ship classes and fewer fighters, the HAF would have the advantage in this fight.

As it should happen, those assumptions by both sides proved to be dangerous.

The HAF fleet had gathered just "outside" the Vega system closer to the spinward area in hyperspace awaiting word from Intelligence ships that had covertly made their way to Vega. As the House Refa fleet jumped into the system, a number of jump points opened around the Jump Gate and around the world. Numerous _Talvan_ cruisers supported by a small number of surviving _Navask_ destroyers came out in four separate battle groups. A much smaller group of _Kendrai_ scout ships came out and setup station around the Jump Gate to keep it from being used against the Centauri fleet. The final jump point that opened contained the _Fist of Refa_, a truly massive _Centaurum_ Battleship surrounded by _Talvans_. Terran Intelligence operatives sent this information back to the HAF Task Forces waiting in hyperspace and it came down to a waiting game.

"That's one damn big ship there in the center of those cruisers Mike." An understatement if there was one from Commodore Harold Desmond to Commodore Michael Sterns from Task Force 816. "Agreed, what battle plan do we use?" was the only reply as the two flag officers came to terms with the overly large Centauri battle force. Looking at the 3-D battle plot, the two officers quickly drew up combat plans that would see their own Cruiser forces combined into one large group that would jump in first. A large Destroyer element would attempt to flank and would be supported by missile-carrying _Flying Foxes_ and the orders for both elements would be to saturate the Centauri forces with massed missile fire (something that the _Epimetheus_ could do equally well). The few corvettes were placed in secondary positions and a possible feint was prepared for them to go for the Jump Gate to see if any other ships could be drawn off away from the main Centauri fleet.

"Here we go into the breach once more my friends." With those words, the HAF Task Forces jumped into normal space and the 2nd Battle of Vega began. Sun Tzu has been quoted centuries ago that "no plan survives combat with the enemy" and those words have been attributed to the immortal Murphy as well and in this case, the HAF fleet managed to stay in good order as they came out of their jump points. Fighters were launched in hyperspace and the Destroyer Squadrons came out for their pincer move on the Centauri right flank. Each Destroyer magnum launched all of their graviton warhead missiles and was fully supported by all of the fighters supporting them. Almost 1,500 missiles were released from the magnum launches by the over 200 fighters and sixteen Destroyers towards the Centauri line.

On the bridge of the _Pride of Refa_ and on the _Fist of Refa_, fear and panic set in for a moment as so many missiles came towards them. The Sentinel Point Defense systems on the _Navasks_ came to life immediately and secondary particle cannons on the _Talvans_ began firing whittling away at the massed missile barrage. Even with the point defense guns on the destroyers, their poor placement prior to the battle caused gaps in the coverage (all due to the lack of experience of the newly promoted House Admiral Jens Refa) and the destroyer captains paid for their poor placement with the lives of their crew and their own lives. Almost all of the _Navasks_ were claimed by graviton warheads that detonated on the hulls of numerous ships and shattered them completely. The larger _Talvans_ were spared for the most part, but several took damage that reduced their combat effectiveness in a myriad of ways.

Responding to the flank attack, the _Talvans_ were caught off guard for a moment as the _Tyches_ came through their own jump points. Those crewman who had watched the historical broadcasts, quickly recognized the wedge shaped forward hulls of the _Tyches_ and very nearly panicked when contemplating the number of guns that could be fired at them. The fleet came close to panic, had it not been for the quick speech from the captain of the _Fist of Refa_ who exhorted the House Navy to greater heights against the Terran Navy. Pushing the huge _Centaurum_ Battleship and the attendant _Talvans_ forward, each of the ships managed to bring their fellow cruisers into line as well and a coordinated barrage from the Assault Lasers powered through the Terran cruisers.

With their Interceptor Grid unable to fend off the Centauri particle beams, the Terran _Tyches_ were heavily damaged. The _THS __Alexander_, flagship of Task Force 12, was destroyed by the salvo as Commodore Desmond led his fleet from the front. The loss of the flagship caused the HAF fleet to break apart while Squadron commanders attempted to bring some semblance of control back to their disintegrated formations. The loss of multiple command ships caused more problems in this regard as well. The only bright point was that the destroyer squadrons remained intact, but the loss of so many cruisers led to multiple fighters without a home to return to post battle. The destroyer commander quickly brought all of the surviving fighters together and each ship commander was given permission to fire off one salvo from their antigraviton cannons then escape into hyperspace.

Those few cruisers remaining behind did the same thing firing off their antigraviton cannons and returning to hyperspace leaving behind over 60% of the cruisers as destroyed hulls. Very few of the Centauri cruisers had been destroyed and aside from the complete loss of the House's destroyers, they remained in good shape for their voyage back to the House enclave at Beta 3.

***-EH-***

Following the disastrous fleet battle at Vega, the HAF fleet retreated to the Ring World's primary Naval Depot over New Earth. The disillusioned fleet members were shocked by the slaughter of the _Tyches_, but the shock was mitigated by the survival of most of the _Epimetheus_ destroyers and the majority of the _Flying Foxes_ from the slaughter. The toughest loss was losing the _Alexander_ and Commodore Desmond to the Centauri fleet. The few officers of sufficient rank and experience were available, but none had the charisma to hold together the various fleet elements.

When all seemed lost, an unknown element introduced itself and offered salvation for the HAF. The questions are: will it be enough to stave off the Centauri and what price will we have to pay? The appearance of a Special Operations group who showed up in their time of need seemed like a godsend to the beleaguered HAF. Questions began to be asked as Bureau 13 surfaced with new ships, weapons, and ideas for the Hegemony.

**AN:** Yes, that Bureau 13 that you're all thinking about [insert evil laugh], but seriously more will be shared about them in the next chapter. To answer the possible questions about locations, I'm using the map of Centauri space from _Wars of the Centauri Republic_, specifically on page 4 along with a jpeg of the system map from 2257 to corroborate locations with "modern" areas. So much is unknown about which House is where that I've added my own locations to fit the storyline.


	9. Beware Greeks Bearing Gifts

**AN:** Just a note of thanks to anyone who left a message following my decision to go on a Hiatus for this story. Without further ado...

**Chapter 8 Beware Greeks Bearing Gifts**

The offer of aid from a previous unknown Bureau caused alarm bells to ring in the minds of many of the HAF's Admiralty, especially when they showed up to the meeting at New Earth with a small fleet of ships never before seen even by those Admirals in the Procurement Division. The arrival of four ships that were larger than anything else seen up to this time in the HAF Navy or Marine Corps was a surprise to everyone, even more so when the technology on the ships was a complete blend of Terran and Kirishiac.

The even more shocking moment that came after these new ships were revealed was that the leadership of Bureau 13 was composed of the Kirishiac Remnant with several of the lead researchers from the HRAD (Hegemony Research and Development) offices outside the Sol system and the Ring Worlds. High Lord Ch'Lorna was chosen as the spokesperson for the group and revealed that after the Terran Senate had voted to restrict funding to the HAF, he and several of the top Terran and Kirishiac researchers decided to work together to produce the technology that would be needed by the Hegemony. They knew that humanity was not alone in the galaxy and that there was other more powerful species out there and the short sighted political decision would doom the Hegemony if they ever had to deal with a more powerful enemy.

The might as shown by the Centauri fleet, even using older ships, was more than evident to all the admirals present when the footage of the Centauri fleet firing their particle cannons into the _Tyche_ formation was shown to them. The loss of so many of the refitted _Tyches_ almost caused the admiralty to sue for peace since so many veteran crews had been lost and the most experienced non-flag officer as well. The pincer attack of the _Epimetheus_ destroyers eased the sting a bit and production was ordered to proceed further for the graviton missiles and for more _Epimetheus_ destroyers to be produced instead of the larger _Tyche_. The few _Tyches_ in service would be further refitted at the newly upgraded shipyards at the Ring Worlds and those few still in mothballs would be given priority to bring them into service faster.

Hanging as a back drop to the discussion by the admiralty were the four newly produced _Constitution_ Frigates, each measuring almost a full kilometer in length and bristling with the latest Terran/Kirishiac technology on each hull. The eventual plan of action to gain the Hegemony the time needed to bring older _Tyches_ out of mothballs and for increased production of the _Epimetheus_ was to send the new _Constitution_ ships out to harass and raid Centauri worlds. The location of several of House Refa's holdings in the Centauri Republic along with several important depot worlds were located by use of scout ships of the Intelligence Division. Each of the new frigates would also be sent into battle with the latest Terran fighter, the newly produced _Tiger_ and it would give the HRAD a chance to see the new technology in action against a non-simulated enemy or an inferior enemy like the Ch'Lonas.

***-EH-***

_Bureau 13's Sordid Past_ online article found across a multitude of forums, original published date unknown

_Bureaus were the old departments of the United Nations of Earth and were considered by many pundits as the reason why the old government failed so spectacularly. The surprise that a new Bureau has come forward is somewhat distressing that old hardline elements from a previous government are still out there and that the various conspiracy theory groups are _right_ in some of their thinking._

_The evidence is there for those who are willing to look for it, but most tend not to look quite that far for it. The little information available at Bureau 13, or B13 as they tend to call themselves, goes back to the formation of the Terran Alliance and later the Terran Hegemony. The need for more advanced systems and to fully unlock the information given to humanity by the Kirishiacs was the principle driving force behind the development of the later HRAD, but others had the same thought much sooner. This collection of business owners, scientists, and later the Kirishiacs came together to form a Bureau of their own that would continue to develop new technology for Terra to make use of in coming years._

_The patent for the Inside-out World concept is one of those technologies unlocked by B13 and sold to the Explorer Division and used so extensively. With so many of these worlds being setup in systems around Terra and even in those systems that have habitable worlds, B13 had enough start-up capital that they were able to execute their intended plan: a "secret" location where they could continue to develop new technologies and to tinker with "older" technology to improve upon it. The use of much of their funds to build their own private "navy" caused enough of a stir that the patent for the antigraviton cannon was released that quickly rebuilt their funds. It would be several small patents each year after B13 was started that would go to increasing the standard of living for Terran citizens or another piece of weaponry or an upgrade for an existing weapon system that would continue to fill up their coffers. The pace of development was enough that all of the ships built by and for B13 had the latest in "experimental" weaponry and the best of the patented gear released to the Hegemony._

_This private navy was originally setup to test out new weaponry and concepts and never really intended for combat operations, or so says many of the documents "found" by researchers and conspiracy theory pundits. The Terran Senate gave B13 the impetus to carry out their plan for a new research complex nearby to Terran space, but outside it when they passed into legislation the drawdown of the HAF Navy following the conflict with the Ch'Lonas. With so many ships sent to mothballs and the crews cashiered, the B13 navy was able to take on many experienced crewmen who had experience fighting the Ch'Lonas and more than a few who also had experience against the Koulani. _

_The lack of hostilities with the Ch'Lonas rather than a negotiated peace, unlike how the Koulani conflict ended, led to some uneasy feelings by many border worlds. The unexplained silence from Ch'lon was later attributed to infighting about the Ch'Lonas and not to any other sinister happenstance. Documents released by B13 and interviews have shown that the B13 navy, augmented now by actual combat veterans, traveled to Ch'Lonas space and exterminated the species. No quarter asked or given and the Ch'Lonas ceased to exist. Ships were shot down as they tried to flee and the Jump Gate there was taken offline completely for study by B13. Their homeworld was destroyed by numerous heavy coilgun shots that used antimatter against the planetary population and every spacestation was destroyed as well. The systematic destruction of the Ch'Lonas was declared complete and every crewman was sworn to secrecy over their act of naked aggression._

_With a safe location for their research to continue, B13 arranged an "accident" for the second of the _Babylon Stations_ by diverting it away from the L5 point (opposite the L4 location of _Babylon Station_ where the Terran Senate has their offices) and into an "unexplained" jump malfunction that took the station into a black hole. Instead the massive jump capable station was diverted to the L2 point between Ch'lon and the native star in that system. Now that they had a station with which to do their research, B13 began to work towards improving the technology of the Kirishiacs had developed._

_Where the HRAD Division found their budgets shrinking and in some cases removed entirely, B13 focused their capital towards several projects. Chief among them was the development of a more efficient artificial womb that could include nanobots earlier in the development of a fetus. Other projects included the complete deciphering of the Kirishiac memory cores and the building and testing of the various military technologies available to them from these cores. The most intensive project to date was the one that combined biological elements, namely polyp, to the construction of warship hulls. The intended goal was for some sort of ship to have a biological component rather than the usual blending of different metals. All in all, the various HRAD groups along with B13's own research teams were quickly at work developing new systems and upgrading and uprating older systems._

***-EH-***

HAF Navy specialists assigned to the newly commissioned _THS Constitution_, _THS Genghis Khan_, _THS Admiral Graf Spee_, and the _THS Jan Smuts_ were surprised at the amenities on the four frigates. Not adhering to the design philosophies present on the current ship designs in the HAF Navy, the B13 inspired ships made full use of advanced technologies once considered too extravagant by the Terran Senate. The use of modified polyp to literally grow the internal hull was one of the features that were most surprising about the new _Constitution_ class frigates. The other surprise came in the form of the main armament, weapons considered "normal" for a Kirishiac warship, but unheard of on a Terran Navy ship. Hypergraviton blasters and cannons were combined with Terran inspired Interceptors and twin medium PPC turrets. Even more surprising was that the ship contained two different jump drives: a "normal" Terran system that made use of emitters and a revolutionary system taken by the Kirishiacs from one of the other First Ones that was termed a phase shift jump drive. The phase shift jump drive did not create the usual vortex in space, but rather moved the ship from hyperspace into normal space with only a small ripple.

All told the new battle plan of harassment of Centauri shipping and surgical strikes on key supply depots and worlds excited the crews at the prospect of paying back the Centauri for their attacks on Terran colonies. The untold danger though was that it could open up the Hegemony to greater reprisals from the whole of the Centauri Navy. This concern was waved off as inconsequential and dismissed by the admiralty that was in a bind due to the need for decisive action on their part. The political situation was poor as well after the battered HAF Navy showed up at New Earth where a film crew caught the heavily damaged ships limping home. The once proud ships came back beaten and bloodied and it played very poorly across many homes and the event was made known to the Senators for each district as well as a major point of contention.

The will of the people of the Hegemony was backing up the military leadership and this was documented in multiple locations to remind the people and the Senate that they supported these measures. No more could the Senate say that they didn't back the military's plan of action or put forward their own plan. To do so would be political suicide from those few moderates and those who backed the original Social Democrat plan for a reduced fleet. The people had spoken and they gave their blessing to the ships of the HAF Navy and to the newly christened frigates as well.

***-EH-***

**Quadrant 15  
Centauri space**

The location of the first series of raids by the _Constitution_ class was the Centauri transfer point identified by Intelligence Division ships at Quadrant 15. A desolate set of space that did not have a habitable planet, instead it was known more for the location and the Jump Gate present there. The _THS Genghis Khan_ exited out of hyperspace with a quiet emergence using their phase shift jump drive, characterized without the usual funnel in space and quietly made their way towards the transfer point and its spacestations.

The enhanced ELINT (ELectronic INTelligence) platforms on the ship were able to identify several patrol ships sweeping through the system and a large ship that had an unfamiliar shape also at the transfer point. Passive sweeps quickly built a picture of a powerful warship that had a gravitic drive capability and secondary plasma or ion engines for tactical maneuvering. Power signatures showed that the ship was currently offline and the presence of numerous shuttles and other small craft around the ship showed that it was most likely taking on supplies. The few weapons noticed appeared to be turreted double cannons of an unknown design and what appeared to be four particle weapons split in twos on each of the wing structures.

Continuing to catalog the various other ships, the _Genghis Khan's_ crew quickly identified over twenty cargo ships and aside from the single large warship, only smaller ships were present in the system. Bringing the main reactors to full power and feeding power directly from the gravitic reactor to the hypergraviton cannons and the spinal blaster, the other turrets began to swing into firing position. Taking great care to aim for what appeared to be the reactor spaces, the spinal hypergraviton blaster fired out a massive orange beam that blew through the central portion of the large warship and neatly bisected the ship with the single shot. The smaller hypergraviton cannons opened up and sliced cleanly through the hulls of the spacestations around the transfer point and the Jump Gate. Secondary PPC turrets began firing pulses of particle fire into the various cargo craft as the _Constitution_ frigate powered its way through the startled Centauri shipping.

Within moments the attack was done and nothing remained of the Centauri cargo ships or any of the patrol ships. All had been destroyed completely by the advanced Kirishiac weaponry on the Terran warship. Sending out recovery shuttles and escorted by _Tigers_, the _Genghis Khan's_ crew took the brief respite to load their cargo bay with some of the cargoes left behind by the Centauri ships. A few judicious beams were sent to rip open cargo containers and in the case of the large warship, an entire section was captured with the ship's gravitic augmentors and brought nearby to dissect at their leisure. The double barreled turrets turned out to be a form of ionized plasma cannons, but of a yield far higher than seen before. Two of the turrets were relatively unharmed by the hypergraviton shot that split the ship in half. The other six turrets had taken damage, but were salvageable. Under orders to take in as much salvage as possible, the captain of the _Genghis Khan_ decided to take as much as possible and had his shuttles bring in as much of the cargo from the cargo ships as well.

Once everything that could be salvaged was removed from the Centauri ships, the secondary weapons were turned on every currently floating ship and they were completely destroyed leaving nothing but the Jump Gate behind and little evidence that the _Genghis Khan_ had ever been in that system.

***-EH-***

The other _Constitution_ class frigates had similar orders as the _Genghis Khan_ and the other three moved through various Centauri systems and continued to hit transfer points and a number of House shipyards. Not as successful as the _Genghis Khan_ to date and only the _Constitution_ had to deploy their gravitic planar dissipaters in actual combat against a Royal Navy patrol of destroyers. The quick application of the hypergraviton cannons and the PPC turrets ended that engagement with no losses for the Terran forces.

As the four frigates delved further deeper into Centauri space, the news of their attacks reverberated through the ranks of the Centauri Royal Navy and through the various House Navies as well. News of ships employing weaponry never before seen and entering and leaving a system without an apparent jump point were quickly written off as the nonsensical rambling of madmen. The results of the raids soon began to mount pressure on the Centaurum brought there by the minor Houses that did not have the same political connections as the larger Houses. This pressure resulted in even more ship deaths as the various House Navies attempted to bring their larger ships to bear and created some runs on commodities as the losses began to mount. Finally the Emperor was forced to send in the Royal Navy to deal with the ships marauding their way through Centauri space.

***-EH-***

**Gorash  
Centauri space**

With so many ships destroyed among the various merchant ships plying their trade in the Republic, the Royal Navy decided to set an ambush in the Gorash system and quickly set about replicating the conditions at Quadrant 15. A series of spacestations were moved nearby to the Jump Gate and several transfer points were setup around these stations. A few scattered merchantmen were placed in the system under remote control and a few of the older ships still used by the Royal Navy were placed near the stations or on patrol in the system. A full fleet of the new _Primus_ battlecruisers and _Vorchan_ attack frigates (from surrounding areas and all that were available) were placed nearby in hyperspace and set to ambush the marauding ships. It was hoped by the Royal Navy that these ships would be enough to discourage the raids or even to destroy the enemy ships. It was still unknown why these ships were attacking into Centauri space and it would take time for additional ships to be moved away from the Orieni border.

The plan had been to lure a single ship or even a small group of ships to the area, going by the assumption that a single ship would not be able to do so much damage as these were purported to have done, but that plan went out the proverbial window when the _Jan Smuts_ detected increased Centauri naval traffic using their ELINT gear. Using another layer of hyperspace to hide their ship, the _Constitution_ class ship was able to detect over fourteen of what appeared to be a destroyer sized analogue and close to twelve larger cruisers keeping station near the Gorash system. Tachyon data traffic showed that more than usual communications were being used into and out of the system and much of the data was heavily encrypted; a sure sign of military frequencies.

Deciding that the odds were not in her favor, the _Jan Smuts'_ captain sent out a quick message to the other raiders to meet nearby if they were able to do so. Only the _Constitution_ and _Admiral Graf Spee_ were able to join up, but the three ships were more than enough for the situation presented to them. Even though the original orders had included some eventualities, nothing covered the present situation and the three captains quickly hashed out a plan to trip the trap and to see what these new ships could do in combat. The data sent over from the _Genghis Khan_ about the salvaged ion weaponry and particle cannons was interesting enough, but until they were seen used in combat it was not quite believable what the weapons could actually do.

The battleplan put together by the HAF captains was fairly simple; one ship would go in to set off the trap and would only use their twin PPC turrets, at least until the Centauri fleet transited back to normal space and then the rest of the frigates would pounce. As each captain was well aware that ambushes can be deadly, but an informed foe can easily turn them around if they have skill to do so. To further "muddy the waters," the _Admiral Graf Spee_ would only use their "normal" jump engines to go into the Gorash system and not their more advanced phase shift jump drive. The _Constitution _and _Jan Smuts_ would use their phase shift jump drive to ambush the Centauri fleet once they showed themselves_._ The captains selected for each of the _Constitution_ class frigates were some of the best that B13 had to offer to the HAF and were all veterans displaced from service following the Ch'Lonas War.

For the Centauri, their battleplan was simple enough: they would wait until the raider or raiders showed up in system then they would come out of hyperspace to trap them. A call for surrender would go out and if ignored they would open fire and destroy the enemy ship. Protocols were put in place to prevent the ships from entering normal space unless over half of the robotic ships were destroyed in the system. With only a few "real" ships taking part in the battle, the Royal Navy captains were well assured of victory and many were already planning their victory celebrations.

The stage was set for an epic battle, but only if both sides were willing to play to each other's plans. For the HAF ships, the _Admiral Graf Spee_ came out of hyperspace using the familiar blue funnel into the Gorash system (having lost the coin toss for who would play the "ambushed" ship). Using only their twin PPC turrets, both dorsal and ventral mounts, against the assembled shipping in system they instantly began aiming to disable the cargo ships to keep up their raider ruse. As the Centauri system patrol ships came closer, their appearance as older ships easily gave away the intended trap. They lasted no longer than the cargo ships and as the last _Jenas_ was destroyed, the Centauri _Primus_ battlecruisers and _Vorchan_ attack cruisers exited out in an englobement maneuver. The larger _Primuses_ supported by the smaller _Vorchans_ released their fighters, in this case the well-designed _Sentri_ instead of the older _Glaive_, and the task force moved into position. As the Centauri ships were about to complete their maneuver, the _Admiral Graf Spee_ sent out the pre-coded message "_Climb Mount Niitaka_."

Using their phase shift jump drive, the _Constitution_ and _Jan Smuts_ exited from hyperspace in a position "behind" the Centauri fleet. Just before they came out of hyperspace, they had begun to fully power up their reactor system and started putting that reserve power into their hypergraviton blaster and cannons. As both ships made their transitions, the hypergraviton blasters shot out more shots than usual and skewered the rear drive systems of the _Primuses_ of the ambushing fleet. Their hypergraviton cannons and twin PPC turrets opened fire shortly afterward firing into the larger perceived threat of the cruisers. An alert _Vorchan_ captain managed to get the "left" flank in a turning maneuver that saved two of the _Primuses_ from destruction by the hypergraviton blasters and cannons firing through the rest of their sister ships. At the same time the _Admiral Graf Spee_ began firing their hypergraviton blaster and cannons and the rout was on for the Centauri.

The rout was not a complete loss for the Centauri fleet as the young enterprising captain of one of the _Vorchans_ managed to warn his fleet element and they managed to break off while the Terran ships began firing on them from behind and in front. The side profiles of each ship did little more than expose a larger targeting area and many of the _Vorchans_ were heavily damaged by Terran fire, but the larger _Primuses_ were able to escape unscathed. The _Sentris_ began their attack runs on the Terran ships, but were quickly destroyed by the effective Point Defense systems on the Terran ships. Making an executive decision Captain Lucien Mollari ordered the rest of his _Vorchans_, numbering just four ships, into a high speed intercept of the Terran ship that started the attack on the Gorash trap.

Each of the _Vorchans_ accelerated quickly and they began using their spinal mounted heavy ion cannons to saturate the defenses of the Terran ship. The vast majority of their shots and others fired from their dorsal and ventral twin ion cannons did little damage against the enemy ship with the ion bolts coming apart well away from the enemy ship or striking an invisible physical plane away from the ship. Soon enough the rate of fire was accelerated as each ship magnum launched their torpedoes and missiles at the Terran ship. The massed fire from the four _Vorchans_ soon overwhelmed the point defenses of the Terran ship, but not before two of Captain Mollari's ships were destroyed from enemy weapons fire. The fiery explosions of the two attack cruisers were able to temporarily blind the sensors on the Terran ship and it was hit by half of the fired torpedoes. The explosions shattered hull platings across the Terran ship and weapons fire began to taper off. Using this as his cue, Captain Mollari signaled the other _Vorchan_ and both ships dove through the same jump point away from the Gorash system. Their fallback coordinates in place, both ships made their best speed to that point.

For the remainder of the Centauri fleet, the initial shock of being counter-ambushed tore through the fleet not unlike the incredibly powerful Terran beam weapons. By the time that Captain Mollari's group of _Vorchans_ broke away and attacked the ambushed Terran ship, the other _Primuses_ and _Vorchans_ were heavily engaged with the other two Terran ships that ambushed them. Their ion fire reduced in effectiveness due to the Point Defenses on both Terran ships and the few Battle Laser shots reduced in effectiveness as well as they all seemed to intersect a point in space away from the hulls of both Terran ships, the Centauri were left with few options. Captain Terns Jaddo was forced to choose between saving those few ships that remained or to throw his fleet against the Terran ships and hope for the best. After a few seconds, his decision was rendered moot as his _Primus_ was destroyed by the insidious Terran beam weapons. Leaderless, the remains of the Centauri ambush fleet watched as several _Vorchans_ escaped to hyperspace and the remainder chose to do the same. Left behind were the damaged and destroyed remnants of ten _Vorchans_ and eleven _Primuses_.

As the last of the Centauri ships escaped into hyperspace, the commander of the _Constitution_ noticed that the _Admiral Graf Spee_ was drifting in space and heavily damaged by Centauri weapons fire. Contacting the _Jan Smuts_, a coordinated rescue attempt was put into place while the two frigates began to use their gravitic augmenters to gather up the wreckage. After several hours of salvaging and repairs to the _Admiral Graf Spee_, the captains came to an agreement on what would need to be done. The _Admiral Graf Spee_ would return to Hegemony space while a number of salvaged Centauri ships including an almost pristine destroyer analogue (put out of action by a single hit from a hypergraviton cannon that went through the bridge space without striking the rest of the ship) would be towed by the other two frigates using their gravitic augmenters. Taking the time to resupply, the _Constitution_ and _Jan Smuts_ would then resume their raiding duties and communications would contact the _Genghis Khan_ to let them know of the situation. Plans in place, the Terran captains set about their work. An unlikely convoy began to travel back to Hegemony space with their spoils of war and a limping _Admiral Graf Spee_.

***-EH-***

**Vorlon space  
****Location Unknown**

It was virtually unheard of that the Vorlons were perturbed for any reason, especially when a supposedly younger race was doing things that should not be possible. Every seeding attempt for the past fifty human years had failed. At first they sent a few small ships since the world should only have satellites and a few rudimentary spacecraft, but instead they were spotted by a human craft and even fired upon. It was unthinkable that something like this would happen to them! To make matters worse, at least from the point of view of the Vorlon High Council, every subsequent seeding mission had failed and some in a spectacular fashion.

The humans had deployed more and more warships around their space and later in hyperspace near their world. The worrisome jump engine design of the humans allowed them to colonize different systems that were normally unreachable for even the Vorlons to travel towards and because of that they were stymied when trying to find other human worlds. Those few worlds that were colonized by humanity were already stripped away by the other young race, the Centauri, and this new war had the implication of the human's death. That was intolerable as well that their Circle would be jeopardized like this and before the Others even awakened from their usual slumber. Something had to be done to fix this situation!

The goal laid out before the rest of their species was that the Circle must be maintained and therefore humanity must be modified for their own good and for the good of the universe. It was for the _Greater Good_ after all. If a ship was found outside the human's domain, it was to be taken without damaging the crew and then modified as was appropriate. The ship would be returned to the humans and the genetic modifications would be allowed to flourish through humanity as was the right of the Vorlons. With those goals in mind, the Council sent out the command through their psychic congress to all the brethren. The only thing left to do was wait for the appropriate ship…

***-EH-***

**Alpha 3  
****Centauri space (near the border with the Vorlon Empire)**

Cruising slowly through hyperspace, the _Genghis Khan_ was making time doing some exploration while the tech crews made some repairs to the ship. Using some of the captured ion cannons from the Centauri, the dorsal twin PPC turrets had been refitted using the ion cannons in place of the particle cannons. The newly christened PIC (Pulsed Ion/Coilgun) turrets just needed to be tested before the particulars would be sent back to B13's HRAD facility. Phasing out of hyperspace back into normal space, the Terran frigate slowly approached some asteroids in the outlying Centauri system known only as Alpha 3. Locking on with the new cannons, it was quickly found that they tended to overheat far quicker than before since the ion cannons generated a far higher heat load than the previous particle cannons. A series of software interrupts were setup with the targeting system to regulate the pulse system to a slower cycling rate of fire than the original particle cannons. The increased damage capability was well critiqued and the revised software brought the heat produced by the cannons well within the cooling capacity of the heat jackets around each mounting.

Called back to the bridge after the main Kirishiac sensors spotted an anomaly, the _Genghis Khan's_ captain made his way from the primary research facility onboard his frigate. As he made his way back to the combat bridge, the ship shook as if struck by weapons fire. The alert system onboard switched to Condition 1 and the captain quickly made his way to the bridge in time for the lights to flicker and eventually go out. The sensor operator had barely made out a quartet of ships that looked suspiciously like the same ones spotted near Terra and driven off by the HAF before they came out of multiple jump points. The weapons fire was just enough to damage the hull and knock out the conduits and power cabling to the main weaponry (incidentally knocking offline the new PIC turrets on the dorsal surface) leaving the ship without weaponry.

Fearing that the enemy ships planned on boarding his ship, the order was given to repel boarders and to prepare the self-destruct system in case of enemy success. Pathways were blocked throughout the ship and the fighter launch bays were sealed. The main reactor spaces were also evacuated and all crew were told to report to secondary defensive stations. Weapons were handed out to those crew members without nanobot enrichments and more than a few of the specialty operatives seeded by B13 prepared their weapon enrichments and nanobots as well for the perceived encounter.

Two of the enemy ships, tentatively identified as being of a type that similar to a Vorlon cruiser or strike cruiser hull, came alongside and grappled the _Genghis Khan_. Several armored suits came across once a hole could be burned in the hull. Luckily the hole was in the relatively unmanned forward hull and the Vorlons would have to transit through numerous passageways to get the habitation sphere towards the rear of the frigate. Making their way through particle and coilgun fire, the Vorlons survived each shot with little to no damage, though for two of them they lost their encounter suits. The now unarmored Vorlons were shown to be little more than glowing balls of light that looked superficially similar to their ships. These unarmored Vorlons proved to be even deadlier as it took several crew members working together to bring one down. A roar of anger was heard, but unlike the seeded races it did not incapacitate the humans, and the group of crewmen was eventually subdued instead of killed.

Once the Vorlons had incapacitated enough of the crew, they brought roughly ten of them over to one of their docked ships. They chose a mix of male and female and unknowingly brought over three of the modified B13 specialists. Each of the humans was placed in a lab structure where they would be modified. Knocked out by the aliens, the crew did not know what was happening to their bodies or even to their DNA. The presence of nanobots in the blood and marrow of the humans surprised several of the Vorlons and the integrated nature of the nanobots made the genetic manipulation incredibly difficult as every change was returned to human "normal" by the nanobots. Discarding their work at the moment, the Vorlons took some time to map out the areas where the nanobots could be found and several liters of blood were taken to see what effect that would have on the humans.

One of the modified humans was brought back to consciousness by her specialty nanobots. The woman woke up groggy and disoriented, but quickly remembered what happened to her and the rest of the crew. A quick thought brought her combat nanobots online and she reviewed her options. She had to escape and to rescue the rest of the crew onboard the ship. The scanner built into her head identified the rest of the crew on the Vorlon ship by their locator chips and mapped out where each of them was held. Of greatest interest were her fellow modified shipmates who would need to be freed first so that they could affect a plan to escape from the Vorlon ship.

A quick slice of extendable claws from her right hand allowed her to escape from the area where she was sequestered. Several large cannon muzzles extended from her now bulging left arm and the specialty micro gravitic reactor came online to power her weapons suite. Making her way slowly through the unfamiliar corridors, she kept getting the feeling that she was being watched and it set her on edge. Quickly finding the pair of doors that led to the other captured crewman, a blast from the small scale coilgun destroyed the doorway with a breacher round. Freeing the other B13 operatives first, she quickly passed on what she knew through their battle network. Giving an explanation that the three crewmen were part of B13's Internal Security Division gave the others pause, but better explanations would be given later. The most important thing that they could do was to escape from their captors. Several of the other crew members used their nanobot weapon enrichments to produce micro scale weaponry and joined in the exodus from the Vorlon cells.

Several of the captives related that their blood had been taken and it quickly became imperative that those samples be destroyed before escaping back to the _Genghis Khan_. Scanning for Terran nanobots, the blood samples were found outside the main lab. Unfortunately for the crew, the lab was heavily guarded by six Vorlons in armored suits. Those crewmen who were augmented would provide covering fire as the three B13 operatives rushed the guards. Those few crewmen who did not have augmentations created a distraction to allow the rest to get into position. Opening fire as a group, the massed micro coilgun and micro graviton warheads made a mess of the Vorlons guarding the doorway. Each Vorlon let out a scream as they were blasted out of their armor and forced to flee before they could be destroyed by the upstart humans. The first human, also the operative who started the break out, through the door fired off all of her micro graviton warheads and wrecked the lab completely. Finishing up the task, she fired numerous coilgun rounds and particle weapons fire into the room as well to make certain that the samples and lab were destroyed. A quartet of her companion operative's remaining micro graviton missiles completed the destruction in the room and left nothing behind for the enemy to use.

The former captives all made their way back to the _Genghis Khan_ with the three operatives leading the group and dispatching Vorlons sent their way with bloody minded precision. Swiftly making their way back to the ship, they came across several Vorlon boarding parties that were dispatched like so many others and continued on carrying some of the survivors who had become injured on the way back. Fortunately for them, the majority of the crew had been held on the frigate and they were the first to be taken for experimentation by the Vorlons. A quick check in the engineering spaces and the main reactor pyramid was reset and power was quickly restored to the ship. Using the shared knowledge, the group of operatives began to manipulate the controls in Engineering to bring the ship online and to prepare the phase shift jump drive to escape into hyperspace.

Disappearing away from the Vorlon ships, the _Genghis Khan's_ crew slowly made repairs to their ship and searched it in its entirety to locate any stowaway Vorlons. Two were found and quickly neutralized by the Operatives and the ship limped towards home with a cargo of salvaged parts and a fantastic story to tell.

***-EH-***

As the four frigates returned back to the Hegemony's space and most notably to the main fleet base at New Earth, they brought back fantastical tales of hostile alien species and new technology finds aplenty. The time and resources that the Centauri had been forced to use to hunt down the raiders had allowed the HAF to rearm and reform several combat groups centered around the _Epimetheus_ destroyer and the newly produced _Sagittarius_ missile ship that used the hull of the _Epimetheus_, but lacked the antigraviton cannons in favor of more missile bays. The new fleet elements were formed into mutually supportive squadrons and would be ready once hostilities resumed against the Centauri.

The technical specifications for the new PIC cannons caused more than one HRAD facility to clamor for the design plans to see what else could be done. The release of the new Ultramatter Cannon, another Kirishiac weapon system, by B13 to the HAF was even more of a surprise. Several of the oldest _Tyches_ were refit with these new weapon systems (the PIC cannons and the Ultramatter Cannons) and put into battlegroups for the planned offensive. Most important of all were the maps brought back by the _Constitution_ class frigates as they showed the best areas to attack the Centauri and where they might be the most vulnerable. Tactical plans were brought together in anticipation of the next series of attacks.

The biggest find of technical data was when the nearly intact destroyer analogue was brought into orbit around New Earth. The ship was a treasure trove of data about the most advanced Centauri systems and the pieces of technology salvaged were slowly put back together and the latest cruiser design could be analyzed as well. The more advanced particle cannons on the Centauri cruisers could be integrated into the next generation of HAF warships and the ion cannons were already put into production as part of the PIC system. Already plans for the reactor systems and even the gravitic drive were examined, but discarded after they were found to be more primitive than what was already in use by the HAF Navy. The particulars of the technology were released onto the 'Net for use by civilian companies and spaceflight enthusiasts as it was of no use for the HAF. The more advanced Centauri fighters were sent to be examined and the best elements to be incorporated into the next generation Terran fighter that was tentatively called the _Nova_.

For the Centauri, the raids across their space and the loss of so their latest _Primus_ battlecruisers and _Vorchan_ attack cruisers were a major setback. Once House Refa was identified as the instigator of the attacks, the punishment set down from the Centaurum was to set a precedent for other upstart Houses. Stripped of their fleet and several of their worlds, the Centaurum hoped to meet diplomatically with these Terrans to see about a peace treaty. They knew that the current decline of their society it would be tough to bring other Noble Houses together into a combat force or even to bring the Royal Navy away from so many stations without further destabilizing the Republic. The Emperor had even been heard making inquiries as to why his meals did not have the very best wines or why the food quality on Centauri Prime had fallen so far of late. Other worlds starved without the shipments of food and essential supplies that had been taken or destroyed by the latest group of raids across Centauri space. That the raiders could only be the mysterious Terrans was of no surprise, but proving it would be far more difficult.

The stage was set and the fate of two nations would be decided; either at the bargaining table or through gunsights.

**AN:** Another semi-cliffy. Not intentional, but rather the best place to end this chapter. Also, take a look at my profile page (if you have not already done so) and you'll find the write-ups for those ships seen thus far in the story (a la in the style of the EFNI's site).


	10. Battles, a Treaty, and Hope?

**Chapter 9 Battles, a Treaty, and Hope?**

**HAF Navy Depot 7  
New Earth**

Following the revelations brought by the _Constitution_-class frigates, the HAF Navy quickly began to apply a number of refits to the existing fleet ships. Once the frigates were repaired and rearmed with the newly designed PIC (Pulsed Ion/Coilgun) mounts in place of their older PPC (Pulsed Particle/Coilgun) mounts and their supplies replenished, they headed out to mount further raids on the Centauri. Only the _Admiral Graf Spee_ would remain behind in Hegemony space due to the heavy damage suffered in battle and because the admiralty wanted a first-hand look at the technology that was used on the ship. B13's HRAD connections pushed for wider access to the recovered Centauri technology in return for the sequestering of their frigate. The added resources routed to them by the Terran Senate made more of a difference as several of the Ring World's shipyards began putting out refitted ships and several newly built _Sagittarius_ hulls as well. The trickle-down of this decision led to greater gains as well for many of the peripheral industries related to ship production.

On the recommendation from Fleet Command, all existing _Epimetheus_ destroyers would be refit to the _Sagittarius_ standard. These uprated missile ships would be placed in mutually supported battle groups and would supplement the few remaining _Tyches_ that the Ring World shipyards were able to refit from the fleet's boneyards. These new combat forces were slowly being formed and readied for battle against the Centauri. A target would need to be found for the fleet elements and the revised combat formations would be tested against the more powerful foe.

***-EH-***

**Centuarum Chambers  
Centauri Prime**

To say that the world was crashing down around House Refa would be an understatement. What had originally been intended to be a "simple" pacification of what was assumed to be a less capable race, turned out to be a major blunder that now had the Emperor no less coming close to an intervention in this matter. That the Emperor even knew of the troubles, as out of touch as he was assumed to be, turned out to be even less good for House Refa. Their fleet was disbanded and their House leadership was summoned for an "interview" on Centauri Prime post haste. Those few worlds were taken in care by the Emperor's prerogative and would not be available for the House for the near future, if even then.

The mood of the Centaurum was even less evident as the Royal Navy had suffered an ignoble defeat by an unknown force of ships and even worse was when it was determined that less than three ships had defeated a much larger force of what was considered to be the most advanced ships. It was more the fact that the Royal Navy had lost, than the actual loss of ships that caused this turn of events and anger to boil over for many of the Houses represented in the Centaurum. That the Royal Navy had dictated terms to each of the Houses in regard to their performance against the Drazi and the Orieni a few decades previously saw more than a few in the Centaurum who were calling for tighter controls over the Royal Navy in light of the disastrous showing against the raiders.

The Minister of the Navy was called to task by the Centaurum and was asked to explain why they had been defeated by such a smaller force. When it was explained that the Royal Navy had originally planned an ambush, each of those Centaurum members who had either served in their House Navies or in the Royal Navy all wondered just how badly the ambush was blundered. When it came out that so few ships were able to counter-ambush the Royal Navy fleet, the general assumption was that a new Minister of the Navy was needed and tighter controls placed on the Royal Navy itself after such a poor showing. Only after long discussions and more than a few backroom deals cut, the current Minister of the Navy was allowed to keep his job. The repercussions of his retention would be made known as his House was restricted in their merchant dealing by those who cut deals with him.

Plans were put in place in case the proposed diplomatic mission was not successful, but many within the Royal Navy were pushing for a renewed offensive. The relatively quiet border with the Orieni was still heavily fortified and many Houses in that area were loath to remove their fleets without a good reason. Assuaging the pride of the Royal Navy was not deemed a good enough reason and it would take an order by the Centaurum and the Minister of the Navy before the Royal Navy could take such actions. Too many within the Centaurum remembered the false starts when they had originally pulled back their fleets that led to the most recent war against the Orieni and did not want to chance another meeting with their old foe. A few non-essential ships were pulled away from the coreward sectors, but several Houses protested this move as well as it denuded the common border with the Drazi. With politics at the fore, the Royal Navy would be stymied in their proposed reactions.

A small force was sent that mixed a few fleet carriers in with the usual _Primus_ and _Vorchan_ ships that would normally be in such a task force. It was hoped that the larger concentration of _Sentris_ (with a few _Glaives_ and the heavier _Phalan_) would assist them against the Terran foe. Contingencies were put in place in the event of the loss of fleet command ships and many smaller formations were put in place for any renewed offenses. More veteran crews were rotated through those ships that did not have the same experience levels and it was hoped that these veteran crews would make all the difference. The eyes of the Houses were on them and in this new endeavor, the Royal Navy made the vow not to fail again.

***-EH-***

**Novo Terra  
Vega system (Contested space)**

Modeled as an Inside-out World, Novo Terra was the first planned in the newly colonized Vega system. The arrival of House Refa's fleet quickly put an end to the burgeoning development of the world. A few colonists had already moved and the basic ecosystem was already in place, but the extensive shipments of supplies and the larger fauna had yet to be delivered. Novo Terra was setup much like Oceania on Terra and the archipelagos were a sight to see. Spread over the salty waters, each was terraformed into replicas of a number of island nations from Terra. A predominately Pacific native selection was at play and many of the islands were planned on the eventual influx of tourists to bring in hard currency.

Samuel Ishida was one of those first colonists. Assigned to a botany team, he was stranded when all Hegemony ships had left the system. Hailing from the island of New Kyoto and the capital city of New Edo, both he and his whole family had moved there directly from Japan on Terra. The picturesque dwellings and several replica castles were all in the predominately feudal style of the ancient warlords of Japan's past. Instead of using extensive farming techniques, aquaculture was used instead to keep the islands pristine in hopes of the tourist trade.

For those left behind as the Hegemony left the Vega system all together following the Centauri attack there; they were forced into a subsistence level consistent with the timelines on display. Reduced to fishing the abundant game fish and secondary fauna to supplement the meager supply of luxury goods, the abundant aquaculture facilities under the Ishida family was all that kept many of the smaller islands nearby provisioned with enough food. The Tennant family not too far away, they were from New Zealand on Terra, and venerating their Maori ancestry also took to fishing to supplement their lifestyle. The two families quickly became fast friends and speculation about outside events became a common place happening between them.

It all changed as the New Year dawned, incidentally the Year of the Rabbit, 2107 would herald changes throughout the Hegemony and beyond the borders as well. As a reserve officer with the HAF Army, Samuel Ishida held the rank of Captain and was greatly surprised when a coded transmission came in that requested local support by any serving officers or any reservists who could serve. After confirming the transmission as legitimate, the new orders were a complete shock. Vega would be host to a massive HAF Navy formation that was preparing to jump into Centauri space in a punitive raid. A truly massive fleet, larger even than the fleet under Commodore Harold Desmond and his ill-fated Task Force 12, began to assemble around Vega itself. The war had started here in the Vega system and many within the HAF Navy made plans to end the war here.

***-EH-***

Very little hope remained for House Refa, they could only hope for vindication if the Royal Navy could triumph over the upstart Terrans, but little hope was held for their once great House. With so many Houses agitating against the rule of the Emperor versus greater powers for the Centaurum, House Refa would suffer as an "example" for the rest of the contentious Houses. Renard Refa was able to convince the Emperor's associates that his House should have the opportunity to erase their stain on the collective honor of the Republic by leading the Royal Navy fleet against the upstart Terrans. His son Jens Refa would lead his _Talvan_ squadrons against the Terrans and in so doing would hopefully erase the previous failings.

The Royal Navy also had little hope left in their ranks. They were forced to accept outside command, where they once before would command that respect. Their losses to the Terran fleet and to several unknown ships had made them out to be fools and their hard won reputation in the Orieni War was in tatters. They looked to vindication prior to the proposed diplomatic missions. Their rationale was that peace would come far easier for the Republic if they could win a decisive victory over the Terrans and they could reap the technological benefits of such a victory. With dreams of the concessions they could wrangle out of the Terrans, the Centauri's Royal Navy began scouting missions to find the Terran fleet.

There around the world that started the problem in the first place, Vega, would become the next battlefield that would determine the outcome of the war. The Royal Navy scouts had detected a large number of ships around this benighted world and the Royal Navy with the attendant House Refa fleet began their trek there. Would the Terrans survive the battle or would the Royal Navy survive? Would House Refa be able to gain the absolution available if they provided stellar service to the Republic? These questions would be answered by the force of arms.

***-EH-***

**Vega  
Contested Space  
January 2, 2107**

It was here at Vega that the war began against the Centauri and it was hoped that the war would end. The _Constitution_ frigates had done a masterful job sowing confusion and mistrust behind Centauri lines. Their mapping missions had shown numerous weak points in the various Houses and the ELINT gear had captured enough SIGINT (SIGnal INTelligence) that analysts would spend years trying to decode and disseminate. Stealthed recon ships also provided up-to-the-minute analysis of where the Royal Navy would be at any given time and they were all pointing towards Vega. Preparations were put in place across the system and it was hoped that they were enough of a surprise for the enemy. Fleets of the newly built _Sagittarius_ missile ships and hastily modified _Epimetheus_ destroyers to the same standard were massing throughout the system. The three remaining _Constitution_ frigates were hiding out in hyperspace as a deep reserve while _Tyche_ squadrons were assembled in depth around Novo Terra.

As before, jump points opened in space and groups of Centauri _Talvan_ destroyers in the livery of House Refa came through them forming up into task forces. Composed solely of the remaining _Talvans_, the House Refa fleet had only these ships to pin their hopes of resurgence upon. The Royal Navy chose that moment to jump in as well in closely ordered ranks of _Primuses_ supported by the lighter _Vorchans_. Toward the rear of the Royal Navy formation was the most important ships of the fleet, the sole _Sakar_ carrier supported by a pair of _Kasta_ support carriers that immediately launched a massive force of _Phalans_ (standard and the missile variant) and _Glaives_ as soon as they arrived in the system. This wave of fighters was joined by the _Sentris_ carried by the _Primuses_ and they soon formed up ahead of the Centauri task force.

For a few moments, silence reigned on the battlefield as both sides came to grips with the number of ships present. The lesser in number Terran fighter contingent was slowly forming up from the _Tyches_ caught in the gravity well around Novo Terra (otherwise known as Vega VII) and were moving sluggishly. Had the Centauri fleet taken the time to examine the situation more closely, they would have realized that the sluggish nature was a sure sign of a possible trap. Instead, they chose to advance quickly towards the seemingly trapped cruisers and fighters. They ignored the destroyers, even though the footage of the previous fleet engagement highlighted that the destroyers carried numerous missile launchers, which would prove to be a foolish decision.

The force under Jens Refa slowly moved up their _Talvans_ into position for a long range strike of their assault lasers while the Royal Navy _Primuses_ readied their battle lasers for the same strike envelope against the "trapped" cruisers around Vega VII. The fighters led by the _Sentris_ proceeded in lanes in escort formation around the larger _Phalans_ and the _Phalan-Ms_ as they prepared for a saturation attack against the Terran ships. While this was happening, the Terran destroyers began moving into formation with the missile ships and they all opened their missile bay doors while awaiting the order to fire.

At the same moment in time, both fleets opened fire, but with different outcomes. The incoming Centauri particle fire struck a number of hidden gravitic dissipater fields; hidden around the world of Novo Terra and placed around the likely fire lanes, though the Terran military planners did not expect them to amount to much. To their surprise, the gravitic dissipater fields proved to be a great help to the HAF Navy task force. Intercepting the deadly particle weapons fire before they could wreak havoc on the _Tyches_ near Novo Terra, the gravitic dissipaters did their job well enough to ensure the survival of the ships there. Of little use after their initial activation, the few projectors that had power would prove to be a great hindrance to the Centauri fleet and a deadly obstacle to their fighters as well as the dissipaters projected a nearly invisible planar projection.

The professional Royal Navy made adjustments to their formation, but the more lackadaisical House Refa force continued to power towards the Terran cruisers near Vega VII. They brought the heavy plasma weaponry to bear, but the Interceptor Grid on the Terran ships ended that attack rather quickly and opened up on the House Refa ships for a coordinated bombardment of the gravitic weaponry on the Terran ships. The close-in nature of the fight made it difficult for both sides to withdraw and this only added to the chaotic nature of the fight. Fighters from both sides were caught up in massive dogfights that the more numerous Centauri craft were winning due to weight of numbers.

Each of the Centauri carriers were held in reserve, but instead of providing an escort formation for them, the Royal Navy split up their squadrons to harass the smaller Terran destroyer fleet. The four Terran destroyer/missile ship groupings continued to maneuver drawing in the Royal Navy ships. The forward battle lasers on the Royal Navy _Primuses_ fired again and again, but to no avail as the Terran ships continued to maneuver away and presented their minimal profiles to them. At this time, the first missiles from the Terran ships began to impact the Centauri ships catching them by surprise. These missiles had been launched from a long distance away by the forward missile tubes on the _Sagittarius_ missile ships and then coasted on kinetic energy alone. The small maneuvering engines then came to life as the graviton missiles began to maneuver and impact on the Centauri ships. In that chaos, the three surviving _Constitution_ frigates exited from hyperspace near to the trio of Centauri carriers.

The large _Sakar_ carrier was nothing short of defenseless against the more powerful _Constitution_ frigates and was quickly destroyed. The better defended _Kastas_ proved to be a tough kill even with the advanced Kirishiac-inspired weapons on the frigates and it was only the gravitic dissipaters on each ship that prevented serious damage from the assault lasers fired at them. Eventually though both _Kastas_ were destroyed by the massed firepower arrayed against them. The loss of the Centauri carriers caused command and control problems for the Centauri fighters and led to reduced capabilities for the more numerous attacking forces. All three frigates then began to approach the rear formation of _Primuses_ and _Vorchans_ and exposed a known weakness on both ships; namely the lack of rearward facing weaponry (aside from some point defense guns).

Up until the arrival of the Terran _Constitutions_, the Royal Navy force was having a grand time supporting the fighters sent against the less numerous Terran fleet. Even with the trapped area preventing the use of their battle lasers and the degraded performance of their ion cannons, both the _Primuses_ and _Vorchans_ were able to destroy two full squadrons of the Terran cruisers. Even those missile strikes from the Terran missile ships were not enough of a problem, though they remained a constant irritant for the Royal Navy ships.

One of the more insightful Centauri captains recalled the capabilities of the Terran destroyers and recalled a large portion of the _Sentris_ in his squadron to take up an anti-missile defense in case of attack. The fighter portion of the battle had been decided decisively in favor of the Centauri and the few missile armed _Phalans_ were having a tough time dealing with the point defense on the Terran ships. This caution was a smart move on the part of the Centauri captain as the assembled _Epimetheus_ refits and the _Sagittarius_ missile ships did a time-on-target barrage of the Royal Navy formation. The missile barrage was split between the House Refa ships and the Royal Navy ships, but more of the missiles were aimed at the House Refa forces (postulated due to the lack of reliable point defenses on those ships).

Missiles in the thousands were fired at both formations and the one Royal Navy squadron with their attendant fighter screen was able to disable or destroy over 90% of the missiles fired at them. The other Royal Navy formations were not as fortunate as their point defenses were quickly inundated by a mass of Terran graviton missiles. Ships on both sides succumbed to missiles, particle fire, and internal explosions as heavy weaponry on both sides struck against hulls and ships were impacted again and again by weapons fire. The vast number of destroyed ships quickly littered space, not unlike the previous battle in the Vega system. Soon enough only a small number of active ships were available on both sides.

Victory was had by the Terran fleet, but it was pyrrhic at best. All of the _Tyches_ were crippled in space, but not before taking a commiserate number of the House Refa's _Talvans_ with them. The combined _Epimetheus_/_Sagittarius_ fleets were scattered all across the system after being chased by _Vorchans_ and in many cases cornered by _Primuses_ and destroyed piecemeal. Those few surviving ships were in bad shape with many of them completely out of missiles and with extensive hull damage. The Centauri fleet could not boast a better position though; those few of the Royal Navy who survived were barely fit for combat and the House Refa forces were destroyed or crippled almost completely. In fact aside from the _Constitution_ frigates, the HAF Navy only had a few ships that were capable of moving under their own power and the Royal Navy had even fewer.

As the two remaining fleets "stared" each other down across space, another jump point opened and an opulently painted ship came through and immediately began to send messages to the Terrans about being a peaceful envoy. The messages quickly stopped once the ship's captain noticed the large amount of debris in the system and the two sides that were split apart. The lack of contact from the Royal Navy prior to their operations unnerved the chief diplomat and he was more than a little perturbed that any chance of negotiations was almost bungled in such a way like this. A quick conversation with the onsite commander of the Terran forces brought about a temporary cease fire to replace the uneasy peace following the aftermath of the battle.

The thought going through the minds of both sides was nearly the same: what next?

***-EH-***

While the Centauri diplomatic team waited aboard their ship, word was sent back to Terra for a diplomatic team as well. Without a hospitable world nearby and the connotations of using the heavily damaged Vega colony as a bad omen, the location for the proposed diplomatic mission came close to floundering. Unable to use a Centauri colony and with the Centauri also unwilling to share such a location, though the decrypted files and maps made by the _Constitutions_ made this unnecessary on their part, a location needed to be found and quickly enough. Remembering that there were two planned Inside-out worlds in the Vega system, the Terran Senate made a momentous decision; they would host the diplomatic conference on Novo Terra.

From the perspective of many within the Hegemony government, the revelation of the Inside-out worlds was an almost taboo and violating it for anything to do with a hostile alien state even more so. However their intent, peaceful contact would be preferable, especially after the preliminary reports were given to the admiralty of the number of destroyed and damaged ships. The revelation that the _Constitution_ class was a Terran design also had some repercussions as they were previously thought of as a possible First One contact given the weapons technology compared to the Terran standard. After many long sessions in the Senate, a diplomatic team was dispatched along with several freighters to bring needed supplies to the Vega system, specifically Novo Terra.

***-EH-***

**Novo Terra  
Vega System  
Disputed Space  
January 6, 2107**

The view of the replica Imperial Palace and even the mountains in the distance did much to calm Samuel Ishida's mind after the vast series of upsets that he had experienced of late. That there had been another large space battle fought over his world of residence was not too unknown, especially given the location, but to host a diplomatic event was unheard of. Having the ambassador sent from the attacking force and having them visit the best kept secret of the Hegemony was even more of a shock. The final shock for Samuel was that he was in charge of the preparations as he was the highest ranked officer of the HAF present on the world, even if it was with the Reserves, and it would be his responsibility to provide oversight here on his home island.

The intelligence reports provided to the Hegemony diplomats highlighted some of the differences between the Centauri's diplomats. It appeared that three Houses had been brought together to form an uneasy alliance. The diplomat from House Kasto was a strong supporter of the current Emperor (for good or ill) and was teamed up with a member of House Bleda who supported a stronger Centaurum. The next member of the diplomatic team was from the more isolationist leaning House Varia, though they tended to refer to themselves as more of a "consolidationist" minded House. The final member of the diplomatic party was a very well dressed female Centauri who was the telepath who came with the diplomats. The three diplomats with their staff were expected to work together to get the best possible outcome for the Centauri people. The one tie that bound each of the diplomats together was their universal loathing for House Refa. That House Refa started the conflict that pulled in House Jaddo and later the Royal Navy was despised by them all and they planned to give a number of "gifts" taken from House Refa's effects in order to further the possible peace accord and treaty.

The Terran diplomatic team was centered on Alexander Sheridan, a well-known and liked diplomat and his small staff. Alexander had brought his young son David to view the proceedings and as a hope to kindle a similar passion for diplomacy that he had. The position of the Terran Hegemony was resolute that the Centauri were the aggressors and reparations would be sought. The detritus over the battlefield would of course be Terran property as the system was currently their own, though the ships present were already found at numerous HRAD installations in the Ring Worlds and had already been thoroughly studied. The additional hulls would give the Hegemony's ship building industry the time and resources needed to push out a new series of designs. Even more surprising to Alexander Sheridan was the fourth member of the Centauri diplomatic party, the idea of telepathy was simply science fiction to him! Yet, he saw before him a woman who was clearly apart, but was still a member of the diplomatic party. He remained puzzled as to why the Centauri would have the telepath with them.

The Centauri diplomats were overawed by the world that they were on and were very surprised that their initial assessment of a lifeless rock had been proven wrong, very much so to their surprise. Even more surprising for them was that the world of Novo Terra was geologically stable, yet had a mountain chain that rivaled many even on worlds across the Republic. The collection of islands and the large palace where they would be holding the discussions was of a major interest to them as well. Several of the diplomatic party was even more surprised that there was no visible farmland or any other larger structures other than the palace in front of them. The quarters provided had proved to be very luxurious and they were prepared for some hard negotiating.

As the negotiations began, the Centauri took quite some time to decry the loss of cargo vessels across multiple transfer points in the Republic. They also waxed eloquently about the loss of the cargo itself and how many of their worlds were still rebuilding after a disastrous war of aggression was carried out against them. Much was said about the loss of Centauri lives, but nothing was told of the actions of House Refa during their initial attacks across the Hegemony controlled space. The one concession given was that it was House Refa who had perpetrated the attacks and their lands had already been confiscated and their fleet was no more. The series of demands for the restitution of the Republic were delivered by the Centauri, but the demands fell on deaf ears. All throughout the proceedings, the Centauri telepath remained quiet, but it was fairly obvious that she was troubled by something, yet brushed off any attempts to end the discussions.

As the Hegemony's diplomats began to speak of the devastation visited upon worlds that had been found abandoned and then explored by them, the looks given to them by the Centauri could be scarcely ignored. Their looks of disbelief were shattered as archival footage showed the thriving city of New Hope as it had been prior to the Centauri attack and the shattered remnants afterward. The loss of so many colonists across Hegemony space could not be explained, though the admission that they were likely taken as slaves caused the first shouting match to erupt by the diplomats. Very little was accomplished on the first day of negotiations, though both sides were able to make their case for what they considered to be "light" reparations. The only matter that was truly agreed upon was that the taking of Terran citizens from the Orion colony as slaves was truly distasteful.

The actual discussions would begin the first night as the Hawaiian contingent from one of the further islands was brought in to host a full luau for the guests. As the Centauri diplomats and their team was plied with alcohol and food that had been deemed safe, the true nature of diplomacy began. Small groups met together to hash out what was considered approvable by either side in light of the very obvious Centauri complicity in the original attacks. Even though carried out by a House, they were still Centauri citizens and the diplomatic team knew that they would have to bargain hard to keep it from being too much of a factor. With bellies full of good food and lots of drink, the diplomatic teams ended for the night with the next day's events to happen later in the day to account for perceived hangovers and over indulgence. The woman with them however did not seem to indulge as much and remained quiet throughout the proceedings leading to many unanswered questions.

Days two, three, and four went by without little done on either side at the official talks. It would instead be at the informal dinners that much was accomplished. The Centauri diplomatic group was heavily stymied by the fact that the three were obviously pushed together by political reason rather than common cause. Adding to the "odd" feeling of the whole encounters, the presence of the telepath kept giving the Terran contingent problems, but more so in understanding why she was there with the diplomatic team. Alexander Sheridan was able to use a divide-and-conquer strategy to wring out concessions from each individual figure from the various Houses, though he was surprised that the Centauri female was present at each discussion. The House Varia diplomat saw that forming a stronger bond through trade was a wise move and after several of the dinners featured wines from around the Hegemony, he wanted them as a trade item and other luxury goods. The House Bleda diplomat wanted more power for the Royal Navy and better equipment for them as well and pushed hard for the more advanced Terran gravitic drive system and the plans for the Terran PPC system (and by extension the newly developed PIC system). Finally the House Kasto diplomat wanted assurances that the Terrans would not go to war with the Centauri Republic once again. His solution was that the Terran fleet would be limited in how big of a ship that they could build and that a limited treaty was to be put in place to support it.

As the negotiations were slowly coming to a close, the Terran contingent quietly asked why the Centauri had the female with them. The lack of guile surprised the Centauri, but they slowly came to realize that Terrans did not make use of telepaths at all. This surprised them heavily and they quickly sent out a missive to Centauri Prime about the apparent lack of Terran telepaths. Explaining away that the use of telepaths was commonplace in the Republic, they were usually there to ensure that negotiations would go without subterfuge on either party's side. Intrigued, the Terran contingent also sent several reports about telepaths and the seeming lack of such an ability in the Hegemony. A quiet dinner between Alexander Sheridan and the Centauri telepath, known only as Lady Heldi, allowed the Terran diplomat to ask several questions that he had about her abilities. Her quiet answers were about few things that she considered herself and her abilities to be entirely inconsequential and was surprised at the questions. Even her abilities could give her little to go by and when asked why she appeared to be ill through several of the encounters, she would only say little or that she was not prepared for the experience. The experience was both amazing and frightening, especially as she later found out that Novo Terra was nothing special to the Hegemony, but rather one of many worlds all using the same basic design. With too many questions, Alexander Sheridan wisely wrote down much of what he experienced in his reports.

Both sides were forced to make concessions, the most unpalatable one for the Hegemony was the limiting of their navy's size to Cruisers/Carriers as the largest ships and nothing of the Battleship or Dreadnought classification allowed. This concession was put in place when it was mentioned that the Hegemony could easily begin production of the numerous captured Centauri weaponry and they could then be sold to the other nations around. A provision was put in place that allowed the Hegemony to retain all of the weaponry captured and that they would be allowed to produce as much as they wanted, but could not export the technology to anyone else. It was hoped that by limiting the size of the Terran fleet, if it ever came to be an issue, would prevent the horrible fleet battles experienced so far by the Centauri. The Terran gravitic drive system was far more advanced than the current Centauri design; namely in that it did not need the fins common with other races' attempts at gravitic drives made it a major point of contention for the diplomats. Little was said though about what would happen with those examples of the Centauri reactors and their own gravitic drive system that was not covered under the blanket exemption for sale to other races. The core design of the PPC system, namely the Pulsed Particle arrangement was copied by the Centauri and quickly became a major system for their own Ion Cannons (similar in scope to what Bureau 13 developed using the captured Centauri weaponry). The coilgun design was rejected out of hand by the Centauri as something that was too close to the Orieni gauss weaponry.

The trade provisions proved to be popular; especially with the Centauri as the Terran luxury goods were far better than could be had by many of the Houses. Examples were set aside to be introduced to the House enclaves and for both the Centaurum and the Emperor to sample. Exclusive trade deals were tabled, though some interest was in place for specific goods to go to specific Houses and their own trade networks. The monies coming into the Hegemony could go to the infrastructure needed for new colony worlds and other systems (much like the Inside-out Worlds) and also for the increased military budgets. One of the more interesting developments that was mentioned concerning trade was that the Republic had a number of goods that could sell to the Hegemony, but until they were deemed safe for the Terran palates they could not be added to the agreement so far. An offhand comment by David Sheridan, in a youthful moment, intrigued a number of the Centauri diplomats when David Sheridan mentioned why not give some of the crops that they used for those trade goods to the Hegemony for them to create a world or even a series of worlds that could grow them in the "correct" conditions.

The final piece of the eventual Treaty of Vega was that the Centauri would cede a number of colony worlds to the Terrans. Part of the worlds offered would be those worlds taken from House Refa by the Emperor and others would be those worlds that could not be easily defended by the slowly contracting Republic. It was bitterly lamented by the Centauri that their society was slowly pulling back their large borders and several new governments had already been formed. The Brakiri Syndicracy's start was due to the contracting Centauri border. The provision put in place would be that the Hegemony would jointly administer these systems and would be ultimately responsible for their upkeep and defense. Once each world had defense stations and fleets stationed there, the Centauri would slowly pull their fleets and defenses back to worlds that were deemed more important. The boon for the Hegemony was that this opened up a large number of potential worlds for exploration and additional mineral resources that could be used to expand the Hegemony. The added trade from the minerals would also enrich both sides as the new resources were found, especially since Terran jump drives could travel to systems normally inaccessible by "traditional" jump drives. The only problem with this policy would the presence of "foreign" Jump Gates that would need to be taken offline and their beacons moved to follow the Terran protocols that their worlds would not be on any jump network.

Final approval of the treaty would go to the Emperor and the Centaurum to approve and to the Terran Senate for their approval as well, but both sides were happy with the provisions laid out in it. Word was sent via courier to both governments and the diplomats took the time off to explore Novo Terra more fully. To the surprise of the Centauri, they were well received by the numerous island inhabitants with plenty of large feasts in their honor. The number of goods for trade quickly soared as the three Centauri diplomats were able to experience a good deal in their time on Novo Terra. The previous comment by David Sheridan was taken at face value and a number of the aides spoke freely during many of the later dinners that they would be pleased to be citizens of the Hegemony, if the Hegemony would take them. This sentiment would be expressed often enough as the Centauri began to transition many of the worlds over to Terran rule.

***-EH-***

The Treaty of Vega was not as well received by the Terran Senate. They could see some good coming from the treaty, namely the increased trade and the fact that they were literally being given a number of worlds to eventually own. The sticking point for them was the reduction in their eventual fleet size, though a number of the more canny politicians noted that it only said the HAF Navy and not the Marine Corps or those "privately" held by Bureau 13 or the HRAD. The HRAD division heads were not happy that some of their more advanced technology was given to the Centauri, in the form of the better Kirishiac-derived gravitic drives, but the ability to use the new ion cannons and battle lasers was tempting for them. Bureau 13 remained oddly quiet during the debate over the ship size limitations and this disconcerted many people.

After a long and bitter debate, the Terran Senate voted to approve the Treaty of Vega with all of the provisions in place, but made known that only the HAF Navy would be culpable to the provisions for reduced size. The lack of understanding by the Centauri concerning how the HAF was sub-divided led to this error (obvious in hind-sight) on their part. The Centaurum also pushed for the treaty to pass and was able to sway the mind of the current Emperor when he was fed delicacies and fine wines from the Hegemony. Declaring that the wines and cheeses were "finer than any others," he gladly signed the document.

On February 1, 2107 the Treaty of Vega was fully ratified and the Centauri began the process of identifying those systems that they would eventually give up to the Terrans. For the part of the Hegemony, the Explorer Command was given broad jurisdiction to catalog each of the worlds and to determine their future viability as Terran colonies. It was during this process that a race of reptilian humanoids was discovered. Their status as an up-and-coming species was noted and the system was fully quarantined to prevent others from contaminating the developing society. Later, once the aliens had developed to a point where technology was understood, they would be approached much as the Kirishiacs did to the Hegemony. Until that time, the system received a number of defense installations and was cordoned off. Aside from the alien species, no other sapient species were found, though a number of worlds did display mega-fauna that made them a curiosity for scientists across the Hegemony. It was during these mapping missions that numerous worlds with large mineral resources were found and set to be used by the Hegemony. Several promising systems were placed on a list for worlds to colonize and others to be setup as Inside-out worlds for various Ring World designs that were just coming into being. Life was good indeed for the Hegemony's many citizens.

The question of why the Hegemony did not have any native telepaths continued to trickle through the Senate and into other parts of the government. It wasn't until the question was brought up at an HRAD (Hegemony Research and Development) facility that was centered around genetics did an answer come to the question. The Kirishiac were the ones who answered that telepathy was not common in Terran DNA, but rather seeded by the other First One races in an attempt to "guide" the younger races to their way of thinking. A light bulb went off in the minds of many of the HRAD technicians as they finally found a possible reason for why the Vorlons continued in their attempts to find Terran worlds. The possibility that they were attempted to seed humanity made sense, especially once Bureau 13 released the voyage records for their _Constitution_ frigates. The encounter by the _THS Genghis Khan_ was explained as another Vorlon attempt to seed humanity. The knowledge that the nanoware in the bodies of many Terrans that could resist the changes wrought by the Vorlons made many who heard the news a bit more appreciative of their nanobots and strengthened the Terran's resolve to resist the attempts made by the Vorlons.

To deal further with the Vorlon threat, the new territory gained from the Centauri withdrawal would be carefully searched for Vorlon influences. If any Vorlon ships were found, they would be attacked on sight and if they resisted, the HAF Navy would be ready for them. Numerous secondary systems were seeded with satellites and other sensing equipment that could detect the coming and goings of other First One types. The advanced sensors that were commonly found on Terran ships thanks to the Kirishiacs were more than up to the task of detecting other First Ones and various other races that were considered part of the younger races. This knowledge was put into a database and the information was well used to blunt several Vorlon attempts at seeding humanity.

**AN:** There you go the final chapter of the Centauri Contact arc. The Treaty of Vega is not unlike the Washington Naval Treaty that limited the sizes of fleets (and was summarily ignored or didn't cover aircraft carriers) and only affects the Hegemony. You can be certain that through some creative bookkeeping and chicanery, the HAF and Bureau 13 will be able to side-step it easily enough. The next chapter will feature some ship descriptions of what was developed and the status of the worlds. More than likely there will be a number of events skipped or glossed over; namely the rise of the League and the events leading up to Terra's efforts prior to their intervention in the Dilgar War.


	11. The Long Road

**A/N:** From the reviews received, it looks like almost everyone came into either one of two camps; really liked the chapter or really hated it. For those who are sticking around, thanks and hold on as this story will go where most other AU's do not dare to travel.**  
**

**Chapter 10 The Long Road**

The road ahead for the Terran Hegemony looked bright in spite of the recent war against a galactic power and highlighted that the Hegemony would need to be far larger if they ever wanted to avoid such a war (or even to win it decisively). The newly signed Treaty of Vega had the potential to give the Hegemony a good deal of influence in the Centauri Republic, but there were many in the government who did not support it fully. It was only after a full year of scans and visits to numerous systems that did not have a Jump Gate present and their presentation of several worlds that were compatible for human life that the government outwardly ceased their resentment over the treaty. The resentment came back full force once those taken from the extant Orion colony were returned in horrible shape. Torture and horrible conditions had reduced the few Terran citizens into images not seen for quite a long time and harkened back to the previous conditions in the former Third World.

On the technical side of things, the limited size of Terran ships was addressed by several HRAD teams who were working with their Centauri counterparts to develop a new ship design jointly. The new ship would be fully modular, more due to the incompatibility between Terran parts and Centauri parts, and would contain a number of new features. The well liked, though flawed, _Primus_ hull was selected for the test design to work out any problems. The hull had been in use since the turn of the century with the Centauri Houses and with the Royal Navy and was the backbone of many fleets. The newly christened ship, known as the _Hyperion_ to the HAF or the _Morado_ (or _Primus II_ for simplicity) to the Centauri, would be a very mobile design that could also function as a light carrier as well.

Trade was flourishing as well between the two governments and a number of the more trade oriented Houses; Kiro, Varia, Jaddo, Mollari, and Kasto to name a few; were happily providing a number of Centauri-produced goods in exchange for the Terran goods. A number of trading stations were proposed over the worlds of Epsilon Eridani, Sorith, and Sirius in order to allow for trade to flow freely from the Centauri Republic into the Terran Hegemony and also for the Markab, Vree, and the forming League of Non-Aligned Worlds to trade with the growing Terran Hegemony. The three worlds were planned out fully with each one gaining one of the large _Babylon Stations_, not unlike the ones over Terra and the former Ch'lon. Each of these systems were to further linked with the new Hegemony Capital at Proxima Centauri as well. The Hegemony agreed to fully fund these stations, but made the requirement that only these worlds would feature Jump Gates and even then only if it was of Terran manufacture.

The wariness that the Hegemony as a whole had concerning the Jump Gates was made more evident as only those worlds attacked by House Refa had a functioning Jump Gate in them. To allay the fears of the other races, beacons were placed near enough to the systems (but far enough away that a Terran world could not be found using the beacons alone) which previously had a Jump Gate. With navigation assured, the Terran Senate approved the step to use only Jump Gates built by them for these worlds. This process was made easier as the Centauri slowly pulled their forces out of the wedge of space that had been given to the Hegemony after the war. A total of four Jump Gates were constructed in the Epsilon Eridani, Sorith, Sirius, and Proxima Centauri systems using this knowledge. The lack of monitoring equipment from the Vorlons (as normally found on the other Jump Gates in the galaxy) was a further sign of development of the Hegemony. Comprehensive software filters kept any potential viruses or malware from attacking these Jump Gates and kept them from the usual monitoring done by the Vorlons.

The worlds formerly owned by House Refa were in poor shape and many of them were abandoned or left with only a science station (remotely operated at that) available there on the worlds. It was with those systems that did not have a Jump Gate that the Hegemony scientists found an abundance of worlds that could easily be colonized or ones that held valuable mineral resources. The most unique finds were several worlds that held sentient life on them, though for most of the races they were barely past the Industrial Revolution point in their development. For those few races that were found, their systems were quarantined and HAF Navy ships and secondary spacestations were put near the systems to protect them from raiders or adventurous Drazi (or other races') raiders.

The newly formed border of former Centauri worlds bordered upon the now growing Brakiri Syndicracy and the Drazi Freehold. Of the two races, the Drazi were by far the most militaristic and many of the outer systems were left abandoned by the Hegemony to form a neutral zone between the two races. This neutral zone was heavily patrolled by the newly developed Fleet groups of the HAF Navy and the Drazi soon came to realize how foolhardy it was to attack one of these Fleet groups. The Brakiri proved to be very interested in the trade goods coming from the Hegemony, especially the ending from an old 2-D television show, which became a major commodity once the episode in question was located.

Relations with the heavily religious orders of the Markab started off poorly, but quickly improved once the martial prowess of the HAF was demonstrated to the ancient race. Relations improved even more quickly once a Hegemony scientist commented after seeing a member of one of the religious orders succumbing to a disease that they could have saved his life. Intrigued by the proposal, several Markab were taken to the newly christened _Babylon Station 6_ at Sirius and their genetic structure was fully mapped by Hegemony scientists. What they found was astonishing as the Markab had been infected by a disease (the drafa plague) that was slowly killing off the species and it appeared that the disease was something that they had for close to 1,000 years. After it was found that the disease was a nanobot plague, rather than the usual vectors of bacteria or a virus, a counter agent was created using the Hegemony's advanced research into nanobots. A cure was given to the Markab and many on the colonies and the main homeworld were cured by the Hegemony's intervention. This proved to be the first of many advancements that were discussed between the two races as joint military exercises were also planned and carried out. The ease with which the Hegemony was able to cure the drafa plague gave many Markab a sense of awe as it "cleansed" away a dark stain from their own past.

The Vree proved to be a problem as the race was more inclined to practical jokes than any serious discussions. After being fired upon often over Terra, the Vree stopped coming into Hegemony space as they were often shot at and several of their ships were destroyed in Hegemony territory. These incidents made relations very difficult with the Vree, though the Yolu traveling with the Vree were able to influence some formation of serious Mutai followers in the Hegemony once hostilities were resolved between the races near to Hegemony space.

An uneasy peace developed between the Terran Hegemony and the newly formed League of Non-Aligned Worlds as many of the signatory nations had been former subjects of the Centauri. The growing ties between the Hegemony and the Centauri made many of the League nations very wary from developing any ties with the Hegemony, aside from some trade ties. The presence of "advanced" Centauri technology (most notably their fusion engine design and jump drives) for sale by the Hegemony caught many of the League by surprise and allowed for a possible vector for future trade options. The open _Babylon Stations_ also surprised many in the League and those postings became a hotly traded commodity for League diplomats once all of the amenities were discovered on them.

It is the height of irony that the fears of the various League races were manipulated by the seeming contradiction found with the Terran peoples; they were warlike, yet resorted to peaceful ventures when it suited them. The building of the _Babylon Stations_ and the various trade deals made them seem less like a "Boogieman" for the League, but still confused the races considerably.

***-EH-***

In the years after the signing of the Treaty of Vega, the Terran Hegemony experienced an economic and societal boom period that lasted close to a century. Many historians have likened this time period as a "Golden Century" and many advances were made in scientific endeavors and with diplomatic ones as well. The extensive use of _geneering_ in Hegemony citizens prolonged their life spans to well beyond what was normally thought possible for humans. Several other noteworthy achievements came as the Centauri Republic began a program of drawing back from their borders. Rather than a chaotic and haphazard drawback, the original provisions of the Treaty of Vega were followed closely and the Centauri were able to withdraw from the shared space with little to no incidents. The sole incidents being when Centauri colonists chose to remain on the now Hegemony-controlled worlds instead of following their families or spouses back to Centauri space.

Many court historians have noted that the smooth drawback and lack of incidents helped to stave off a possible Civil War between the various Centauri Houses and the Royal Court following the war with the Hegemony. The support garnered by the current Emperor when the Treaty of Vega was signed went a long way towards mollifying many of the more rebellious Houses and further solidified support from those Houses who were already pro-Emperor leaning. By no means did this dissolve tensions within the more rebellious Houses, but the destruction of House Refa made many of them more wary when operating publicly, indeed several operations were cancelled when House Refa was destroyed culturally and militarily. The greatest concern by some of the more isolationist Houses came about by the influence of the Hegemony on the politics of the various Houses and the inroads gained through trade.

The incidents were diplomatically smoothed out by the burgeoning Sheridan family that quickly came to be known as the foremost diplomats throughout Hegemony space and beyond the Hegemony's borders. The only problems to crop up in the "Golden Century" were those as the Terran society expanded quickly and went through some "growing pains." Jobs were plentiful and the HAF Navy experienced a long period of growth and development as the new Fleet ideals came into place. The only sore spot that remained was the restriction of the HAF Navy's overall size, but that was mitigated when the HAF's Marine Corps developed the massive _Nova Troop Cruiser_ to carry their Combat Teams safely into an active war zone. The original provisions in the Treaty of Vega only held true for the HAF Navy, a point that was noted by many in the HRAD and Admiralty when questioned about the treaty's possible limitations on the Hegemony's military development.

During the "Golden Century," the Explorer Division was able to erase the black mark against them (though it would forever change their ideals) as they discovered several large mineral deposits that greatly benefited the economy of the Hegemony. While not needing Quantium-40 to build their own jump drives, the materials were created instead by using the Terran mass concentrator system, the other races around the Hegemony had need of the mineral. Large ships were developed that could haul the ore to various worlds in the League or to the Centauri. The effect of this development was the large amount of foreign monies coming into the Hegemony that greatly aided development of the burgeoning colony worlds.

Tourism also became a big venture for the Hegemony as the _Babylon Stations_ attracted tourists and the star systems that held the Terran spacestations were also host to several Inside-out worlds that proved to be very popular with non-Terran visitors. Much like Novo Terra, these Inside-out worlds were formed into ideal tourist zones for a variety of alien physiologies. The preponderance of systems that held Terran-compatible biospheres were quickly selected for development by the Explorer Division and the lessons learned made certain that each world was well defended by the HAF Navy and the orbital defenses were developed into a far tougher setup. The blatant cronyism of the past was something that proved difficult to eradicate, but the technological gains made those defense satellites selected for colony defense all the more powerful.

The advances in _geneering_ and other sciences made it possible for new worlds to be developed quickly with strains of Terran wheat and other grain crops that made these new Terra-compatible worlds into instant breadbaskets for the rest of the colony worlds. Of special notice is that many of these systems have been hidden away from the rest of the galaxy as a whole as they can only be reached by use of the Terran jump drive. Featuring some of the youngest citizens, these breadbasket worlds also have some of the largest populations outside the Ring Worlds or Terra herself. These worlds also feature defense grids far larger than any other Hegemony world to help defend these worlds from attack.

The number of new systems necessitated a change in the location of capitals of the Terran Hegemony. Terra and the Ring Worlds were left as the cultural and engineering heart of the Hegemony, but a new capital was needed to lessen travel times and reduce the lines of communication for those who could not travel to the location of the new Senate. After much deliberation, and not too many difficult meetings, the Proxima Centauri star system was selected as a place where another _Babylon Station_ (in this case _Babylon 3_) would be sent to represent the Terran Senate. The Alpha Centauri star system formed a nearly trinary setup with the Proxima system, but because of the tidal forces present most ships are unable to travel there. The Hegemony built a major fleet depot in the Alpha Centauri system to support the new capital of the Hegemony and several Inside-out worlds were seeded and formed into the Second Ring Worlds around Proxima. Much like the First Ring Worlds, these systems are all in areas where "traditional" jump drives cannot travel to and "surround" Proxima with fleet bases and shipyards.

The new initiatives to develop multiple Ring World systems proved to be popular as the First Ring Worlds are home to numerous HRAD installations, shipyards, and HAF Navy bases. The resultant development of additional Ring Worlds would give the Hegemony a needed boost to their internal economy and would also provide a number of easily defended positions that were not on anyone's star maps. Each of the other _Babylon Stations_ (_Babylon Station 4_ at Epsilon Eridani, _Babylon Station 5_ at Sorith, and _Babylon Station 6_ at Sirius) would also gain their own Ring Worlds complex that gave them a defensive setup that would keep them safe as well. Well liked by many of those alien species who visited them, the massive _Babylon Stations_ remained a very visible sign of the might of the Terran Hegemony to every species that visited one of the stations, and was the sole item that was not for sale by the Hegemony.

***-EH-***

Jane's _Ships of the Terran Hegemony_ entry for the _Hyperion_ August 24, 2109

_The Hegemony Armed Forces (HAF) Navy has had a proud tradition of developing new ships and keeping abreast of the latest in advanced technology. The war with the Centauri is the one time when this was not true, but that was more due to political pressures and decisions of the time. Following the signing of the Treaty of Vega, the HAF Navy was limited in the size of ships to those considerably smaller than the massive _Centaurum_ battleship used by the Centauri. Instead, the HAF would have to make do with smaller cruiser-sized ships. The one provision left off of the treaty was that carriers were not affected by the size limitations._

_The development of the _Hyperion_ was at first to be a test bed for new technologies developed from captured Centauri weaponry and based partially on their _Primus_ battlecruiser design. When the Centauri were allowed to work with Hegemony engineers, the newly designed cruiser would be an able replacement for ship that had entered service prior to the start of the second millennium. The Hegemony engineers working on the project were surprised that the Centauri had gone for so long without developing a new design or even doing more than simply modifying their ship designs with weapon and sensor refits. _

_At the simplest form, two hulls were built with the modularity that has become a hallmark of Terran designs. The idea of modular fittings is nothing new, but everything on the ship can be easily replaced in a matter of minutes instead of days or weeks on older hull designs (most notably the _Tyche_). The prevalence of an organic internal structure on the HAF design made it necessary for two keels to be laid; one Centauri and the other Terran. The organic polyp hull was specifically _geneered_ to incorporate _mithral _and _adamantine_ in the structure of the hull (much like the armor composites that protect Terran ships). Grown into the proper shape by master shipwrights, the time needed to build a hull by "traditional" means was actually halved due to the induced grow times thanks to the use of gravitics._

_With both hulls laid down, the Centauri adopted the Terran pyramidal reactor setup. Making use of five reactors on their _Primus_, the Centauri adopted the Terran design which features one large reactor (in the case of Terran ships a Gravitic Singularity) surrounded by a pyramidal structure of four secondary reactors (in the case of Terran ships an Energy Captor System) that can feed power into the larger reactor and is able to be replaced quickly and without too many difficulties. While the Terran system uses the waste Helium and Deuterium from the Energy Captor Systems that have been gravitically modified for greater mass before being fed into the Gravitic Quantum Singularity for increased power, the Centauri make use of "standard" fusion. The addition of gravitic systems to the reactors has improved their efficiency and so provides the _Morado _(or_ Hyperion _or _Primus II_) with increased power for the new weapons suite and gravitic drive system._

_One of the more sticking points of the Treaty of Vega, the use of the more advanced Terran gravitic drive system is best illustrated by the lack of drive fins on the new ship design. Not needing the fins that the Younger Races use on their ships with gravitic drive systems, the Terran design instead make use of a field of gravitic energy that envelopes the hull and covers a far larger surface than the paltry fins of other designs. The best benefit for the drive system is that the non-armored gravitic drive fins are not a target as on other ships. A pair of gravitic enhanced plasma engines gives the ship an added tactical benefit and is actually more powerful than the quartet on the original Centauri design. The only point of contention is that the actual acceleration of the ship design is lower than the quad engine design of the _Primus_, but the higher strategic speed makes the ship well suited for long distance operations._

_The other sticking point from the Treaty of Vega (at least from the Terran point of view) is the addition of the Pulsed Ion turrets on the Centauri _Morado (_or_ Primus II)_ in place of the older House Tavari ion cannons. Using a multi-barrel design common on the PPC and PIC systems used by HAF Navy ships, the Centauri version has a far higher rate of fire than before and the turrets are located in a better position on the hull. Now capable of firing to the rear as well as bringing the full armament into the front quarter of the ship, the ion cannons can easily support the new placements for the battle lasers. Instead of being mounted two on each side of the ship; now a single one of the powerful particle cannons is in a spinal mounting and one is mounted near the "wing tips." The mountings for the battle lasers fully protect them from battle damage than the original design placement and are easily replaced due to the new Modular fittings. To make up for the perceived lack of firepower a focusing mechanism was mounted on the barrels that allow the battle lasers to be fired in a 30 degree arc of each cannon. The old point defense systems were updated to reflect the multi-barrel design and their placement is in a new set of locations that keep the ship from being surprised by smaller ships and fighters._

_The small craft complement was increased from the _Primus'_ eight _Sentris_ to twenty four fighters and up to six shuttles. This differs from the HAF's _Hyperion_ in that the HAF version has thirty two fighters and carries four shuttles. The difference is more in that the HAF uses a larger squadron size of sixteen fighters versus the Centauri Navy's standard of twelve fighters per squadron. Eight missile ports have been added to the front of the ship on the hull structure where each of the "wings" extend out from the main hull (four on each side). The Centauri version of the ship has an additional six missile ports mounted next to the spinal battle laser bringing their total up to fourteen from the eight launch tubes on the HAF design._

_All told, the biggest change is the outward hull shape that appears to be more of a four-pointed star than the manta ray shape of the _Primus; _indeed it has been remarked that the outward appearance is very reminiscent of both the Terran _Tyche_ or the _Constitution_. The forward hull is angled so that all the turrets can be fired forward and the focusing mechanism can bring the battle lasers to bear forward as well. The lack of gravitic drive fins and moving the main bridge from the upper hull into a far more armored section in the center of the ship has also increased the survivability of the design. The engine system as well is fully protected in the center of the ship. Only the turrets can be attacked, but that is due more to the design philosophy of having all of the firepower available where it is needed most. Even the launch and recovery systems for the fighter and shuttle bays are well protected and unlike many other races, the fighters do not launch forward from a main bay. This one major point of weakness in many ship designs was removed so that the ship is better protected from forward attacks. From the front or the sides, the newly designed ship has a very narrow profile. It is only from above or below that the ship has a larger profile.  
_

***-EH-***

**Narn Homeworld  
Terran Hegemony space  
October 2208**

The ascension of a race is a joyous occasion, especially when the race was allowed to develop as the Narn were doing. They had reached the point of moving past an agrarian lifestyle to moving into cities and developing an industrial civilization after close to a century of development. Terran observers were poised to watch the launch of the Narn's first spacecraft into orbit around their planet as the first big step toward true development into an interstellar power. The Terran Senate had already voted to extend to the Narn the hand of friendship once they reached this milestone. In order to keep any entanglements or missteps from marring the process, the diplomatic corps would be in charge of the mission.

Observers on an Explorer Division science vessel were there to document the progress of the Narn spacecraft and to support a Diplomatic team under the command of David Sheridan III, which also included his young son John. As the observers watched the launch of the small spacecraft, the ship's advanced sensors showed a ship opening a jump point nearby. Afraid of what the alien ship would do, the science vessel brought the full stealth systems to the fore (the stealth systems developed from what the Kirishiacs had taken from the Torvalus) in the hope of avoiding the potentially hostile ship. The science vessel had been built on the hull of a retired _Constitution_ frigate and still retained some of the more advanced Kirishiac systems onboard. The most important of them being the incredibly powerful Kirishiac ELINT systems. However, the ship lacked the powerful Kirishiac weaponry as they had been removed once the ship was transformed into a science vessel.

As the alien ship came out of the vortex from hyperspace, it was revealed to be a Vorlon vessel. Remembering the numerous attempts by the Vorlons to capture a Terran vessel, the crew of the _THS Darwin_ readied themselves for an attack from the Vorlon ship. Instead the Vorlon ship sped towards the Narn homeworld and it appeared that the Vorlons were intent on doing something to the Narn. Recognizing the violation of Hegemony space, the _Darwin_ transmitted a message to the Vorlon ship warning it away and also called for assistance from the closest HAF Navy Squadron. The crew of the _Darwin_ went to Condition One throughout the ship as the diplomatic party was sent to the best protected location on the ship. Gravitic Dissipaters were brought up to full power and even without the spinal mounted Hypergraviton Blaster or the side mounted Hypergraviton Cannons; the _Darwin_ still had the turreted twin PIUC (Pulsed Ion/Ultramatter Cannon) systems to defend itself with against the Vorlon ship. A series of missile bays, not unlike what is commonly seen on the _Sagittarius_, were included to make up for the lack of heavy ranged firepower.

As the Vorlon ship continued to look around the Hegemony ship, it still continued on its path to the Narn homeworld unabated by the messages from the _Darwin_. Left with no other recourse, the stealth systems were taken offline by the captain of the _Darwin_ and the ship fired off a warning shot near the Vorlon ship. Caught off guard, the Vorlon ship stopped in space. Before another shot could be fired, an angry voice came across the communications circuit. "Insolence" and the circuit closed just prior to the Vorlon ship opening fire on the _Darwin_. The discharge cannon was able to cut deeply into the forward hull and was barely mitigated by the Gravitic Dissipaters and much of the damage later proved to be superficial to the hull with no breaches. Return fire scarred the hull of the Vorlon transport as the Ultramatter Cannon shots penetrated the ship's shielding with ease. The ion shots were less able against the more powerful shields and did little to the ship.

Ordering a full salvo of graviton missiles, the _Darwin's_ captain took to maneuvering to keep the Vorlon ship away from the Narn homeworld. Even with his turrets able to fire enough to keep the Vorlon ship away, the _Darwin_ eventually ran out of room to maneuver. Worse yet, the exchange of weapons fire was enough that the Narn spacecraft noticed it as well leading to a feeling of shock and awe at the exchange of weapons fire in the heavens. Just as the Vorlon ship had come close enough to corner the _Darwin_, a jump point opened and a HAF Navy Squadron came through in full battle formation. The leading _Olympus_ destroyers came in front of the large _Avenger_ carrier and the escorting _Hyperion_ cruisers. A quick salvo of battle laser fire destroyed the Vorlon ship, but the damage had been done.

Making the best of the situation, Ambassador Sheridan ordered the _Darwin_ to close with the planet and had a single shuttle craft outfitted to fly his team down to the planet for their first true contact. He hoped that the Narn would be prepared to deal with the realities of not being alone in the universe and that they would be good citizens of the Hegemony. From what he could see of the world, it was lush and beautiful, not unlike Terra. His hope was for peaceful contact and the weapons exchange in the Narn system was enough to surprise the race enough to accept that there were those out there beyond their skies. The Narn spacecraft pilot was treated to the sight of the _Darwin_ coming close by his orbit and he was in awe of such a large ship. The full might of a HAF Navy Squadron further added to the situation, but to the betterment of the diplomatic situation.

Eventually after some failed starts, the Narn gladly joined the Terran Hegemony as full members and had full rights accorded to them when they joined. Eventual forces would be raised crewed by Narn crews and a set of Ring Worlds would be built around Homeworld, with the Ring Worlds complex being the seventh such built in the Hegemony. The Hegemony now had another race that was fully a member of it; counting the Centauri settlers who chose to remain when the Centauri's borders shrank and those members of the Markab who gladly joined with those who saved their race, there were four races working together without too many problems. The Narn had some issues learning to tell the various humanoid species apart (though to their mindset, everyone else was the alien), but quickly came to realize the differences after several undiplomatic occasions.

***-EH-***

The technological revolution of the Terran's "Golden Century" was most notable for producing a number of advanced versions of several "common" technologies known in the galaxy. Jump drives are so common that every race that figures out how to use the eponymous Jump Gates seeded throughout the galaxy eventually figure out how to use these as well. With the Hegemony making use of a different system for their jump drives, the actual jump drive used by the common races in the galaxy has seen little research done to it. It was only after the Centauri ships were recovered during the war that much of their technology was released to the general public as a kind of "open source" technology demonstrator. This status as an "open source" technology made it available to anyone who had the time or inclination to modify the technology to their own suiting. The only prohibition was that if a person or university wanted to test the system out, they would need to have approval from their nearest HRAD facility.

The numerous HRAD facilities across the Hegemony have come across as a mixture of mad scientist lair with a university science laboratory. This has not been helped due to the attitudes of many of the staff at these facilities. The number of applicants to test out their jump drive modifications soon numbered in the hundreds following the war with the Centauri. Most of these modifications failed and in one case failed spectacularly enough that the solar system where it was tested was declared as an ecological disaster area due to the failed experiment. The most successful test was one that was the most revolutionary concept: it made use of a liquid allotrope of Quantium-40. Using buckyballs surrounding a single atom of Quantium-40, a new allotrope was created that had a liquid form naturally. The new jump drive used a helical matrix of the liquid Quantium-40 with another helical matrix of a coolant surrounding a solid sliver of Quantium-40. The combination of the liquid Quantium-40, known as Naquada (named after a mineral from a popular television show), with a solid sliver of Quantium-40 gave the best power to weight ratio of any minerals tested. The sliver was incredibly small, just a few kilograms as opposed to the tons needed by most of the other races for their jump drives.

Unlike so many other products, this potential jump drive actually worked well enough to impress the watching HRAD technicians. Power was sent easily enough to both the sliver of Quantium-40 at the core of the drive system and to the helical Naquada and the power used together made opening a jump point easily enough for any ship design. The only impediment to ship design was a reactor capable of handling the compact nature of the jump drive and to provide the correct amount of power to the paired Quantium-40 matrix. All that was needed to solve this problem was additional support from the HRAD installation providing an appropriate sized ship to handle the proposed jump drive. The resulting design was compact, far more compact than anything in use by the League or the Centauri and would leave whoever used it dependent on the Hegemony for the Naquada in the drive system.

Combining the new jump drive with a modified version of the Centauri's own fusion engine design, the HRAD division approached the Terran Senate for the ability to export out the design to the League of Non-Aligned Worlds or even to the Centauri themselves. Since the design process was using "standard" technology and any user would be dependent on the Hegemony for the Naquada, it was approved for full production. Several of the League races approached the Hegemony only for the fact that the drive system was smaller than comparable designs and they would gain access to the Centauri's more advanced fusion engine design (even though the better designed Hegemony design would not be for sale). It was the height of irony that the Centauri actually purchased the jump drive for their own merchant shipping lines without realizing that it was their own basic reactor design and a jump drive based on their own design.

***-EH-***

As the League of Non-Aligned Worlds was in the process of forming and going through growing pains, the Hegemony was poised to support any of the new nations that made up the non-aggression pact of former Centauri colonies and other powers. The growing pains of the League caused some problems for the Hegemony as several of the races, like the Drazi and Corillani, sent raiding fleets against Hegemony held space. The HAF quickly proved that it was a power to be reckoned with when several of the raiding parties were completely destroyed without any survivors. To make their point known to the Drazi that the neutral zone was a buffer between them, the HAF sent a large Fleet to destroy two Drazi forward bases and the point was quickly made. In the case of the Corillani, they had been penned up by the Centauri and only ventured out when they no longer detected Centauri patrols. Once the situation was explained, the Hegemony opened up trade rights to some mineral resources nearby as a means to appease the situation.

The rest of the League was placated by favored trade status and the resulting economic boon allowed the League to survive past their initial growing pains. The Centauri also benefited from the economic boon as the Hegemony was willing to trade with any side and facilitated trade with the League even though many of the races were former colonies of the Centauri. The Hegemony's lack of previous preconceptions about the various League races allowed them to act as a viable go-between for various trade missions. The number of mining stations, most notably Wolf 359 and Barnard's Star, produce a number of valuable minerals that the League and Centauri have need of to fuel their economies. The hard currency is used on additional trade goods and those few pieces of technology that the League nations are willing to sell and those that the Hegemony does not already have access to from the Kirishiac cores.

***-EH-***

**Bureau 13 Headquarters  
**_**Babylon Station 2  
**_**Formerly Ch'Lonas space**

High Lord Ch'Lorna took a brief moment to look out from his vantage point on _Babylon Station 2_ out over the fleet yards and the first newly produced ships of the Hidden Fleet. He was surprised that the Terrans had survived against the more numerous Centauri fleet, but then realized that the Centauri had grown decadent and soft. Even the Treaty of Vega was an opportunity if it could be modified to only include the current HAF Navy and not the nation as a whole. This loophole was covered up masterfully and the lack of complaint from Bureau 13 seemed just like what the cryptic organization would do as expected by the rest of humanity. He even considered for a moment the hubris of the Centauri that they accepted the situation as it was without complaint.

The simple fact that the Terrans were developing a line of ships with the Centauri did not please him, but when it was explained by the Bureau 13 and HRAD heads that a "public" fleet was a very good way of giving the other galactic races what they thought was the height of Terran might. Instead, the development of a "hidden" and "public" fleet could continue further. The ease of slipping past the additional funds was an alien concept to him, but he accepted that it did work in an odd way. Something that he was coming to like about the Terrans was their ease of duplicity when it suited them and forthrightness as well.

The slowly forming hull of the newly christened _Warlock_ line was pleasing to his many sensing organs. The lines of the ship were unmistakably Terran, but the innards and weaponry were even better than his _Lordship_ had been during the war against the other First Ones. It was amazing what these Terrans could develop and more than likely it was their own brand of ordered chaos that allowed them to make the advances using what had been the pinnacle of Kirishiac technology and the technology taken from the other First Ones. The first of what would be the most powerful Young Race ship was slowly being built in another slip and the _Warlord_ would be inspiring when it slipped those bonds and came out to do battle with the ancient foe the Shadows.

Reflecting back to what these Terrans call their "Golden Century," his thoughts turned to the "found" Shadow ships on Sol IV and on the moons around Sol V and VI. These dormant vessels were inert and handled with the utmost care by the Bureau 13 engineers. Even the HRAD teams were careful as the Shadow ships were taken apart piece by piece and the technology was slowly assimilated into the Terran's body of knowledge. That his old foe would strengthen the vessel of their vengeance was sweet to him. The knowledge gained would also go to finding ways to defeat the armor of these ships and already some of the research was finding out new ways of combating this most ancient of foes.

Even the Vorlons with their still pathetic attempts to seed a common telepathy gene were laughable at best. That was the sole reason why the more advanced Kirishiac-derived sensors were the first pieces of technology disseminated to the Terrans and why the Vorlons remained stymied in their attempts. Their Circle or struggle with the Shadows would be ruined and those First Ones would see why it was better to destroy your foes than to leave them behind to gain strength. As a people, the Kirishiacs were dead, but their legacy would live on with the Terrans.

The best technology remained to be fully developed, but the design teams headed up by the joint HRAD/B13 division heads was showing good progress on understanding it. Only the application of these systems truly needed to be done and the _Constitution_ class was a good first foray into the most advanced Kirishiac systems. Even passing on the three remaining ships following the war with the Centauri on to the Explorer Division did little to keep the technology under wraps. The new _Marathon_ and _Artemis_ also looked to be progressing fully and the crew requirements had been reduced thanks to the artificial brains grown into the ships. That his people had to use an artificial means to prolong their usually long lives was a bit galling, but they would still be able to live on as the heart of each massive ship. Only the truly impressive ships would gain their knowledge of warfare and Ch'Lorna himself had already selected the _THS Warlord_ to hold his memories and to keep them alive.

***-EH-***

**Internal Memo  
Bureau 13 Human Resources  
July 2110**

To all staff present, please be aware that any attempts to circumvent the smoking monitors in the restrooms will be treated harshly. We have designated smoking areas on the _Babylon Station_ for a reason and your continued attempts to challenge this will result in more than the usual punishment.

That said I would like to congratulate the Special Weapons Division as they were able to show the utility of their nanoware designs, especially the miniaturized coilgun and the miniature gravitic reactor for our more modified operatives. As per the bounty program, the Special Weapons Division will be allowed some leave time in the "lower" Ring World sector for some R&R. Other congratulations go out to the Orbital Weapons Division for developing a satellite platform that it is little more than a Heavy Weapons Orbital that can support a Hypergraviton Cannon and a power supply. The patent on this system has already generated substantial income for the organization and other new designs look to be just as useful.

All told, we have a number of key systems that will enhance the life expectancy of the individual Terran citizen and we also have several new markets for our medicines after the Markab disease was cured. The Medical Division should be complimented on their work along with the Nanowarfare Division for the aid given to the Markab. They should be a strong ally for us in the future.

To the other Divisions not named in this memo, your hard work is paying off and the bonus checks for good ideas and viable patents have already been passed out. To those who did not receive a check, don't worry, you will get an opportunity in the future to advance your case as more hard currency flows into the organization. If you have an idea that you would like for the organization to fund, approach your Division heads first and if it is a viable idea it will be passed on to the leadership.

One final set of instructions as told to me by the Internal Security Division and that is to the person or persons unknown who keep eating the lunches of the Security Division from their clearly marked fridge that it has now been trapped and setup with biometric scanners. Let it be a lesson to anyone who makes an attempt on their fridge.

***-EH-***

_Effects of _Geneering_ on Infants and the Use of the Artificial Womb Technology_, _New England Journal of Medicine_ October 2142

_It has been stated that _geneering_ is a safe activity and for many people in the Terran Hegemony this has proven to be true. However for some, the widespread _geneering_ that has taken place following the war with the Centauri has led many to question the effects on infants born to those who had the more widespread and common _geneering_ and for those infants birthed in the artificial wombs. While many medical tests have been done to determine any detrimental effects due to the extensive modifications and nanoware used by the medical industry, it has only been in the past few years as dedicated research has been done to determine the true effects._

_The effects as determined in the _Bolivar Study_ are that the nanobots begin to infect all parts of the musculoskeletal system and the cardiovascular system of the patients in question. Eventually the bone marrow became self-replicating factories for the nanobots inside the body. Once the nanobots have been joined in the body, it is basically impossible to eradicate them. Unless a dedicated counter nanobots is introduced, the nanoware continues to self replicate until all the body's cells are saturated with them. There has not been a proven defect noticed in those bodies that feature full saturation of nanobots and it has even been noticed that the nanobots will defend the body against any form of intrusion. The intrusion mechanism appears to be selective as pregnancy and the growing fetus are not considered to be an intruder, but a parasite is not as fortunate to survive._

_The _Bolivar Study_ also postulates that infusing a fetus inside an artificial womb with nanobots from the time that it is implanted actually accelerates the birth rate and development of the infant. The more rapid growth of the infant has led to increased births and a correspondingly higher birth rate when compared to deaths in the Terran Hegemony. The true baby boom came about following the war with the Centauri and now almost forty years later, several generations of natural born humans and womb born humans have inflated the numbers of the Terran Hegemony. The number of new colony worlds and Inside-out worlds all need citizens to inhabit them and the new births have led to a boom on these colony worlds. The highest numbers continue to be the highly sought after botanical worlds, followed by the agricultural worlds, and finally the new Ring Worlds._

_It has been noted that the nanoware being implanted in infants and in young children has another further benefit for them; in that it allows these children to learn at an accelerated rate. The nanobots form an information network throughout the body that rivals the most powerful data networks that are built on the Kirishiac systems. This improved network of nanoware makes it very possible for each child's brain to be added to the circuit giving them tremendous intellect and powers for learning. By "uploading" information directly to the nanoware, each child can learn a set number of tasks quickly and without the usual school experience. Only those jobs that require actual "hands-on" knowledge require classrooms, though for many of them they remain more of a novelty than the standard. This discovery has furthered the development of after-school clubs and social groups to properly train children in how to interact with their peers._

_Further study is necessary as the numbers of children continue to grow up using the more advanced nanobots than ever before. One additional side effect of the nanoware appears to be that human lifespans have increased ever since the nanoware was introduced. It has been theorized, but not actually laboratory tested, that the nanobot's predilection for destroying foreign invaders and for keeping the body in working order has made cellular degeneration a thing of the past. It is unknown how long humanity will continue to live on, but the breakeven point appears to be the actual time when nanobots were implanted in the patient. If they have been born with them, the theoretical old age is just that theoretical. If the nanoware was implanted later, that has been shown to be a middle ground where life expectancy is not as high, but certainly longer than what is possible normally for a human._

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 3  
**_**Proxima Centauri  
Terran Hegemony space  
April 24, 2211**

The massive _Babylon Station_ was held in station at the L4 position in the Proxima Centauri system and a number of ships continued to move around the station. While Proxima had been named the new capital for the Terran Hegemony, many diplomats and ambassadors all knew that Terra would always remain the capital (if not in name, but due to the location). The new capital was more of symbolic purposes to show that the Hegemony was willing to trust the other races in the galaxy with the location of such an important world. That the _Babylon Station_ was a fully mobile station and equipped with an armament that would rival many fleets of other race's ships was best left unsaid. Even the large number of HAF Navy Squadrons moving through the system and patrolling towards the Alpha Centauri system did little is dissuade trade with the other nations. First and foremost, the _Babylon Station_ was setup to handle trade and to provide a home for the various diplomats and ambassadors.

Home to the lead diplomats and ambassadors, the other _Babylon Stations_ (4, 5, and 6) were also home to diplomats, traders, and ambassadors but the primary ones were housed at _Babylon Station 3_. The League as a whole was astounded by the artificial gravity generation and the advanced hydroponics on the station. In fact the entire forward five kilometers of the station was given over to an artificial biosphere not unlike was has been done with the Inside-out world concept, but in miniature. The oddest part was the tourist appeal of the massive docking arms and cargo network that seemed to attract more tourists than the main biosphere. Perhaps it was that these docking arms could fully offload the largest mineral transporter in less than half an hour through the use of gravitic fields or that the sheer spectacle of large ships moving by were awe inspiring for so many of the races.

For Ambassador David Sheridan III, ambassador to the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, very little of this was in his current train of thoughts. He had been hearing of a very militaristic race on the coreward side of the galaxy near the "north" edge of the League that had been making the news due to their armament of multiple fleets. Many of the League's own ambassadors dismissed the claims and many were instead talking about the Most Favored Nation (MFN) trade status that the Hegemony had only given to two races, the Markab and to the Centauri. All of the League nations wanted that status as it was a "green light" to increased trade and fewer tariffs. Even the practice of the Hegemony to not charge fees for use of the four Jump Gates in their territory was unheard of in practice and few others were willing to offer the same concession. More at stake was measuring up to the high standards demanded of the Hegemony to gain the MFN status.

Concerned that the situation could turn bad, the HAF Navy had been asked to send a small fleet of three ships (a _Hyperion_ cruiser escorted by two _Olympus_ destroyers) to the League and for them to travel towards this possible danger area. The _THS Persephone_ (a _Hyperion_) was in full command over the mini-Squadron (including the _THS Rio de Janeiro_ and _THS San Diego_, both _Olympus_ Destroyers) and was under strict orders not to provoke any actions. Of further note was that the Explorer Division sent out their newest ship, the _THES Challenger_, from the new _Magellan Explorer_ series to map that area of space. Finally Bureau 13 also sent a single ship to test the stealth systems and the newly developed Shadow-derived weaponry and gear to see if the Shadows or their agents had come out of hiding. It had been determined that several members of House Refa had been given directions to Terran colonies to determine the viability of humanity in a large war. It was hoped that the fully organic outer hull of the new _Shadow Hunter_ would allow the ship to pass among the younger races without detection and that the rumored race of living ships coreward would not be tempted to fire upon the ship as it had done to so many others of technological origins.

The stage was set and it was only the performers who would be needed to see what would happen. Would the League and by extension the Terran Hegemony be drawn into a war or would it fizzle out and be nothing more than a border skirmish or two? The questions would be answered shortly and Ambassador Sheridan hoped that it would be done without more bloodshed on the part of humanity.

**AN:** We're getting ever closer to the Dilgar War and the War will start as it did. This time around, though, humanity doesn't have the same reputation with the League. This is due mostly to their closer ties to the Centauri (remember that most of the League were at one time Centauri subjects). The Narn and Centauri never actually fought in this timeline and there is no actual antipathy between the two races. So not much of a chance to see Londo and G'Kar at each other's throats at all for this story.


	12. Beware Sleeping Giants

**AN**: Thanks for reading.

**Chapter 11 Beware Sleeping Giants**

Even in spite of the relative peace granted to the Hegemony by their absorption of former Centauri colony worlds, there still were problems experienced by the growing nation. Many people were not happy with the state of the Hegemony due to what they termed "outside" influence, even though many of these same individuals did not complain about the Kirshiacs and their own influence on the development of Terran society. The development of the Terran society continued to experience growing pains as the development of the new worlds and the Inside out worlds continued on at a fevered pace. Even the addition of outside "alien" species as joint partners in several ventures caused the development of secret societies that were themed on an elitist ideal that had no basis in fact.

Many of these societies were united around a central point of view of what they termed to be "purely" Terran. The harsh reality remained that there were very few Terrans who were close enough to the "original" baseline of humanity before the Kirishiacs changed Terran society. There were societies that rejected the modification of the genome and many others adopted a nearly Luddite culture. It was the height of irony when several of the more prominent Luddite societies were able to amass enough funds to have their own Inside out world created far enough away from the rest of what they termed "corrupting" influences. Leaving out that they would inhabit the very structure that was the height of advanced gravitic design that was caused by the Kirischiac influence, many people chose to join with the Luddites to live a life of peaceful contemplation. Even though the very idea was derided by many, there would always be those who were disaffected by "modern" society who would join up with them.

In the Terran year 2203, tensions continued to rise in the Hegemony leading many to term the next two decades as a period known as the Second Cultural Revolution. The rise of the societies were termed more of a cultural situation as the period of increased development known by many as the "Golden Century" led to even more personal freedoms than ever before. The increased funding brought by the sale of minerals found due to the increased territory led to fortunes being won and lost increasingly across the Hegemony. The addition of labor saving devices (in ever increasing numbers than before) made things easy to find and to do in the Hegemony. The increase in size for the "normal" through the use of artificial wombs also helped to contribute to the rise of the societies.

A semi-hedonistic air was found on many of the inner-Hegemony worlds, not unlike how the Centauri do things, but few joined those societies as before. The majority of the inner Hegemony worlds tend to be more integrated to the day clubs that many children and teens congregate in following the imprinting of knowledge into their nanoware. These youth continue to stay in touch in the future and continue to operate in cliques of their peers. It is not unheard of for many groups to join up together when they reach their majority (at the age of sixteen) and continue together throughout their subsequent training phases.

The development of these societies and other social groupings led to a number of strange situations as those former Centauri colonists came into contact with these disparate elements. The Narn found it strange just as much as some native Terrans, but there were several within their own society who joined with the more inclusive societies that had been formed. The "strangeness" of these societies started to clash with both the Terran-only societies and with the mainstream parts of the Hegemony. These clashes soon involved law enforcement and in some cases with the HAF. The only group that didn't find these societies so strange was the Markab, more due to their penchant for warrior societies and other functions. Even the most reclusive Markab warrior society, especially those who held their notions of the drafa plague, started to see the wisdom of allowing in their saviors to join their own warrior societies.

The general opinion of the various Kirishiacs who were still alive considered the development of the societies as of little consequence. Many of them had noted that their own society as some time in their own past had gone through these moments as well. That they survived was proof enough to most observers that this situation would eventually move past the current state. Those that would not move past would be left behind since they were unproductive and did not deserve the life that they had at the moment. Those who remained in their societies did not care for the opinion of the Kirishiacs much like they did not care for anyone else's opinion of their own species as well.

***-EH-***

_Wars of the Terran Hegemony_ _Doctrine of the Force _excerpt, New Avalon Military Academy Press, August 2214

_The early military history of the Terran Hegemony was best known for relatively easy victories against the Koulani Directorate and the Ch'Lonas (now extinct). Facing off against a higher tier opponent like the Centauri proved that heart alone wasn't enough to defeat a better armed, though unprepared foe. Even with the terms of the _Treaty of Vega_ causing many within the Hegemony to "chafe at the bit" due to the restrictions of the treaty, many other organizations began to take notice of the wording of the document. Both the HAF Army and Marine Corps had not been mentioned, more than likely due to the massive over-presence of the HAF Navy, by the document and thus not held to the same parameters as the original provisions. Bureau 13 and the Explorer Division are also not named by the document and it has been shown through the years that both agencies have their own resources that have been made available to them for their own operations. It is of unique interest that Bureau 13 is known to house the Kirishiac Remnant and their obvious connections to various HRAD installations should see some _interesting_ designs coming out in the next few years. _

_This lack of recognition, at least by those outside the Hegemony, has led many to underestimate the strength of the HAF (Hegemony Armed Forces). With only the Navy a readily available force that is known, most people see little of the Army or the Marine Corps (an attitude that both services seem to perpetuate as well) aside from recruitment drives from the two branches. The little that is known of the Army and the Marine Corps is that the two branches have their own fleet of ships to transport their combat elements. It is amusing to note that these ships do not have to abide by the terms of the Treaty of Vega, unlike the HAF Navy's ships.  
_

_The best known of the two formations are the Marine Corps through their use of the CAAN (Cavalry Armor Aerospace Naval) combined-arms commands. A single CAAN combat team can be carried by a modified _Tyche_ hull and the prevalence of this type of ship in the HAF Navy has made it difficult to realize that a CAAN team is around or operating. Following the war with the Centauri, damages to the HAF Navy Squadrons by combat against Centauri has reduced the number of _Tyches_ that are in operation in the HAF Navy. This has increased the likelihood of finding a CAAN combat team in operation. Their niche as the first reaction troops that have been used against pirates and isolated outposts alike have given the CAAN units a lead in recruiting troopers._

_The CAAN unit's combat doctrine is built around the ability to quickly travel to a target world and to deploy a number of troops that operate much like a special operations team. Mobility and rapid reaction capability are highly prized for the CAAN commands. Much of their equipment is built around this paradigm, but at times it has been known to leave them with a decided lack of heavy armor or firepower. It is unique to note that the CAAN units are the only HAF units that make use of true aerospace fighters (i.e. fighters that can transition from space to atmospheric flight), unlike much of the nascent League nations or the Centauri. Little is known of the capabilities of the other First One races, though the Kirishiac designed ships have all proved to be atmospheric capable (an ability that is not known to be shared by the other First Ones). The few tank designs used by the CAAN combat teams are better related to the antigravity tanks used by the old League nations on Terra, though these are also multi-role designs that include the ability to carry infantry into combat. The other tank design used by the CAAN formation is termed as a _Cruiser_ design. Cruiser tanks are those that are designed for high speed operation and tend to be deployed in a singular role or in small groups. They are lighter in size and have the excellent PPC (Pulsed Particle/Coilgun) used so heavily in the HAF as their armament._

_The HAF Army has had little chance to gain combat experience, aside from dealing with some pirate groups (mostly Drazi troops on isolated worlds). Their technology remains top notch with some of the best equipment put out by Terran industries. It is ironic that even with the capture of Centauri small arms during several of the raids by Marine Corps units, the small arms and equipment used by the HAF Army has not changed at all since the branch began operating. Still using the popular micro-scale particle cannons and coilguns, the HAF Army is well equipped for combat in a multitude of environments._

_Built around a force structure that is more top-heavy than the CAAN paradigm, HAF Army BCTs (Battalion Combat Teams) are able to project forces where needed. Much like the CAAN formation, BCTs are combined-arms, but use different equipment. Making use of _Infantry_ tanks, these tanks are designed to fight alongside infantry (in this case powered armor) and used en masse against typical enemies. Using the same PPC design, they tend to mount multiples of these powerful weapon systems on their tanks. Fewer antigravity craft, though the same one is used by both formations, are used by the HAF Army and mostly to deploy their larger number of infantry in powered armor._

_Pulling together both the Marine Corps and Army together was a tough task, but the eventual formation that truly welded the separate commands together is the Regimental Combat Team (RCT). Composed of four combat regiments and a transport element, the RCT is formed from regiments which themselves are formed from either four BCTs or four CAAN units. The "typical" RCT is composed of three Army regiments (themselves composed of four BCTs) and a single CAAN regiment (composed of four combat teams). While this may be the "standard/typical" arrangement, any number of regiments can compose each RCT formation. Each regiment can be carried by either _Tyches_ (CAAN units) or the new _Nova Troop Cruiser_ (Army regiments) with a "standard" RCT having three _Novas_ and a quartet of _Tyches_ to transport the full unit._

_Much like the Kirishiacs themselves operate in powered armor, so too do the formations of the HAF Army and Marine Corps. Differing only in size of combat suits, these powered armor troops represent a far more dangerous foe than the typical combat solider of wars in the past. Even those who have been augmented by nanoware have their strength increased many times more over when using the principle powered armor._

_Weaving all these elements together are an incredibly powerful battle network that allows commanders to communicate directly with forward combat elements to eliminate (though not completely erase) the condition known as _fog of war_. With every combat vehicle (and in many cases warships as well) tied together into the battle network also known as the BattleNet, information is far more easily dispersed by commanders to the correct formation at the correct time. The larger scale of this is best seen during combat exercises held on any number of Inside out worlds or those worlds that have been deemed as unsuitable for colonization._

***-EH-***

_Dashed Dreams of a Decadent Empire_ article in _Politics Now_ September 2125

_Dreams have a habit of remaining unrealized many times through no fault of the dreamer. Other dreams die stillborn through their own follies or faults and remain unrealized. The dreams of the Centauri for a large empire remain strong even though their empire has started a decline that has slowly, but surely been a long time in coming. The use of slave races made them strong for a short time period, but the recent decline of the empire combined with the Treaty of Vega has given the Centauri some breathing space in the short term._

_The short term consequences of "giving" territory to the Hegemony following the war between the two races has allowed the Emperor to remain in power far longer than usual, especially as many of the more pro-Centaurum Houses have been especially quiet after the destruction of House Refa. This lack of intrigue from the more contentious Houses has allowed a fairly weak Emperor to remain in power for far longer than would normally occur in the "Republic." Restructuring of the Centaurum to give the Noble Houses and those Houses that had less political power (in many ways it can be extrapolated that this change is likely due to the Terran Senate's setup) were able to gain political power that they had up to this time lacked._

_The introduction of what has been termed "Terran" ideas has really changed the face of the Centauri, even more so due to a number of Centauri citizens who have chosen to stay in what is now Terran space. That so many of these people were the second sons and other "second" class citizens has allowed the Centauri's Emperor to remain in power for a far longer period of time. This increase in support for the Emperor, especially from the more trade minded Noble Houses, has seen a marked increase in trade with the Hegemony. The location of one of the massive _Babylon Stations_ nearby (Epsilon Eridani) has allowed for an increase in the amount of trade goods traveling to the Hegemony and allows Centauri merchants to have increased profits (incidentally giving them even more power in the Centaurum)._

_Other ideas that have changed the thoughts of many Centauri in regard to their leadership is that the Terrans have given rights to so many peoples (even more remarkable, at least from the Centauri point of view, is that their own species has those same rights) that only the best of the Noble Houses have had access to in the Republic. Moving aside centuries of "tradition" has been difficult for the Centauri, but it appears that aid from Terran diplomats has given them some assistance in this regard._

_Ironic as it may be for the Centauri, the war with the Hegemony has been a good thing for them. Few see it the same way, especially those hidebound Houses that pine for the long lost days of when they could say that they "ruled the galaxy and made everyone afraid of the Lion of the Galaxy." Even these holdouts cannot doubt that increased trade has aided them greatly and those few worlds "lost" have not been of any consequence to the Republic. The Emperor's support for the Hegemony has truly solidified relations, but it really was the joint development of the _Morado/Hyperion_ that made the two nations closer than before._

_The other ironic part of the situation is that the League of Non-Aligned Worlds views the Terran Hegemony as little more than as a vassal race of the Centauri (leaving aside what they truly can see). The technology of the Hegemony appears to be nothing like what the Centauri make use of, but then so too is that technology used by the Orieni (another race beaten by the Centauri). Unlike the Orieni, the Hegemony remains an example of what trade and duplicity can accomplish in interstellar relations. Duplicity is a bit more difficult to measure, at least for outside "observers," especially as the main HAF Navy groups are a common sight near to each of the _Babylon Stations_. Trade is far easier to measure due to the number of ships that are commonly found near the four _Babylon Stations_ that facilitate trade between the Hegemony and the League and with the Centauri as well._

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 4  
**_**Epsilon Eridani  
October 2209**

The Epsilon Eridani has remained a unique system, a statement that truly understates the word "unique," this was made more apparent as the system was scanned using the Kirshiac-derived sensors so common on Terran ships. What was found was astounding to all onboard the Explorer Division ship; a complete First One scale series of structures were found inside Epsilon Eridani II. These structures were found to contain an unknown alien species, with not even the Kirishiacs knowing the species, and even more surprising the "custodian" appeared to be dying. When one of the crew was selected to become the living component of the "Great Machine," the information was sent out to several HRAD offices and to Bureau 13's main offices. Instead of having to create an Inside out world in this system, the Hegemony had an ideal platform of knowledge that could be used as living quarters as well.

The Great Machine proved to have a number of technologies that have disseminated into the technology base of the Hegemony after a few false starts. Those false starts proved to be learning experiences as well, to a degree that proved humorous to a Kirishiac observer. It would be from this information that the first ship produced using the _Naquada_-powered jump drive came into being. The lack of a "traditional" jump drive in the Hegemony led to a number of problems creating a ship that could be sold to the various League nations (and even to the Centauri) that would have them reliant upon the Hegemony for technical assistance. With the secret of _Naquada_ known only to the Hegemony and produced only at the _Babylon Stations_, the newly developed _Clipper_ series of transport took shape.

The development of technologies found in the Great Machine were disseminated to each of the _Babylon Stations_ and the _Clipper_ line of ships have found a niche as a wholly Terran designed ship that is sold to outside races. Most League races remain at odds with the decision by the Terran Senate to not sell older combat ships due to the proprietary technology on them, unlike the Centauri who have sold off multiple lines of their older ships to the highest bidder. Indeed with the development of the _Morado/Hyperion_, the Centauri have begun to sell off the oldest cruisers in their inventory have created a glut on the open market for older warships.

***-EH-***

_Anatomy of the _Clipper, _Popular Mechanics_ November 2210

The development of a dedicated merchant ship by the Terran Hegemony came as a surprise to both the League of Non-Aligned Worlds and to the Centauri. Accustomed to being told that the Hegemony is not willing to sell any of their technology, the introduction of a non-combatant for the civilian market caught many races by surprise. The _Clipper_ is a somewhat pricey design, but many have been purchased, if only for a chance to say that the buyer has an "authentic" Terran design.

The _Clipper_ line resembles a sphere that is 250 meters in diameter. The rear section of the spherical ship houses the primary reactor system, in the case of the export design a Centauri reactor system that originally powered a _Vorchan_, but built in the Hegemony for export purposes. Power is fed through multiple control cables to the forward part of the sphere which houses the main bridge area and the crew quarters. There are several features that stand out on the _Clipper_ line and the biggest surprise is the artificial gravity (that is able to adjust for various physiologies) and the large infinity pool. The pool provides a location for exercise and relaxation. Several small bays in the forward part of the sphere allow the ship to carry "high-value" cargoes or those cargoes that require special conditions; i.e. specific temperature ranges or atmospheres.

The _Clipper_ design becomes even more capable when the craft opens along the central point to accommodate cargo modules that measure 50 meters in length. These cargo modules are able to be docked to a central column that runs through the ship. Up to five cargo modules can be carried that allows the ship to carry a multitude of cargo types or even passengers. The odd look of the _Clipper_ design when it is present and off-loading the cargo modules at a _Babylon Station_ or League port or Centauri spacestation has led many spacecraft crews to call them "Bar Bells." Expanded out to 500 meters, the _Clippers_ have been known to carry a wide variety of cargoes and are a frequent visitor in this configuration (and others as well) to multiple League and Centauri cargo stations.

The specialty jump drive is housed behind an armored bay on the front of the sphere and when combined with the single gravitic enhanced plasma engine, the ship lives up to its name (named after the speedy sailing vessels of Terra's past). The availability of the new ship has even impressed several Terran shipping companies and the ships have begun to be a common sight across known space. The Smart Modularity that remains a hallmark of Terran designs is noticeable as well when the Terran-only version of the ship was unveiled to the Terran market. The sole Energy Captor System is enough to power the ship and provides deuterium for the gravitic enhanced plasma engine while providing enough power to activate the Terran jump drive system.

For those ships that have to travel through the more dangerous ports of call, the _Clipper_ line also is able to carry a newly designed system (at least for the Terran market) in the form of a High Energy Laser. Referred to as the HELP (High Energy Laser, Pulsed) system, the laser is mounted across the hull of the _Clipper_. Using a series of capacitors to allow for a rapid series of pulses to be fired, the laser is an ideal defense against raiders that use fighters to strike merchant ships. With the turrets retracted into the hull, an unsuspecting raider has little warning that their target can fight back against them. Against larger ships or even those few raider ships that are jump capable, the laser system can do a surprising amount of damage when the capacitors are used all at once for a single high powered beam. Doing this leads to a far longer recharge rate and the more powerful gravitic enhanced engine system will have to be used to escape the hopefully heavily damaged or destroyed target. Those ships that are built for Hegemony-only deployment have Interceptors in place of the HELP system in addition to the other systems that are Hegemony-only.

The League remained surprised that such a ship would be sold to anyone with the appropriate credits to buy them, especially since it features a powerful gravitic enhanced plasma engine and a Centauri reactor system. When the Terran salesmen wave off any concerns about the design, the various League powers tend to think that it is too good, but they usually decide that having access to the more powerful Centauri systems is a good trade-off. Without realizing that they are now wholly reliant on repairs to the jump drive system, especially for the _Naquada_ that makes up the jump drive, the League nations have all decided to invest in the design (more for being able to acquire the "more technologically advanced" Centauri systems than anything else).

***-EH-***

_Newspaper Article, Hegemony Times _October 1, 2230

_War Erupts for League of Non-Aligned Worlds_

_The forces of the Dilgar Imperium led a series of strikes against their neighbors of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, specifically the Abbai world of Tirolus, the free trade world of Alaca, and the independent world of Balos. The attacks by the Dilgar came as a surprise to many within the League and the outside powers. Very little was said about this series of attacks though by the Terran Senate and the Centauri Centaurum. It appears that both larger powers are still waiting to see if the strikes are limited to raiding parties or if they are more than what they appear to be. The other League states appear to be set to stay on a higher alert status depending on their location to these affected worlds._

_The last official word from the Senate spokesman to any Terran citizens who may be in the League is to "hurry home, trade can wait." It appears as though the Centauri are heeding this advice as well and is sending an identical message to their traders to return to Hegemony space at the least for safe haven. What little is known of the League's own diplomats is that though many of them are calling for mobilization, instead the League's main governing body has not chosen to do anything other than to provide for some refugee movements through each other's territory.  
_

***-EH-***

**Warmaster Convocation  
Omelos, Dilgar Imperium**

Gathered around a large table to discuss the progress so far was a collection of all those who had a hand in the execution of their campaign against the League. Warmasters and their aides sat around the massive table and all paid heed to the Supreme Warmaster Gar'shan as he discussed possible future targets and the intentions of the various League races. As he droned on, Warmaster Jha'dur saw her brother Sha'dur playing with an odd object. It looked like a pack of cards, but appeared to be made of metal. Not wanting to be in insubordination, she chose to wait until the League part of the briefing was over.

As the head of Intelligence began to recite the other races that could interfere, either the Centauri or the Terrans, both Jha'dur and Sha'dur's attention was on the object. Jha'dur almost missed the loud scoff from Len'char when the Terran military might and possible strength was mentioned.

"These Terrans are soft and weak. They remain lapdogs of the Centauri and we should not fear them at all. I see no reason to worry about them or what they might do against us." Len'char's words echoed among the various Warmasters as they all seemed to be deep in thought or openly staring at his words.

"You are a fool Len'char, even a blind Pak'ma'ra can see that these Terrans are a possible threat to us." Jha'dur savored the look on Len'char's face and thought to herself, 'the fool still thinks that I should be grateful to him for his elevating me from my university position to where I am now. A fool and nothing less is expected from him.' "What you cannot see Len'Char," here the sarcasm seemed to be just dripping from Jha'dur's words, "is that the Terrans have shown themselves to be far stronger than what you may think of them. They have subdued the Drazi easily enough and before you start on about the Drazi, not even the Centauri have managed such a feat. I do believe that we should be cautious in our dealings with the Terrans. They are not our enemy now and we should take great pains to keep it that way."

Even as Jha'dur looked around the room, she could see that her words had little effect on the assembled Warmasters. Each was still in their own thoughts and they were all flushed with their successes. Gar'shan ended the meeting on this note. Jha'dur hoped that the actions discussed would not be the death knell for the Dilgar people. She was also curious about the object that Sha'dur seemed to be playing with throughout the meeting.

***-EH-***

**Warmaster Jha'dur's Quarters  
Omelos, Dilgar Imperium**

"What is so interesting about that piece of equipment that you kept playing with during the Warmaster's meeting Sha'dur?" Jha'dur looked annoyed at her brother, though she did have fond memories of when they were children and he had the same look when playing with a new toy.

"Jha'dur!" The delight in Sha'dur's voice was plain to his sister to hear. Evidently the device had a purpose that Sha'dur had been able to figure out. "This is just incredible; you have to see what this device can do!" Indeed, it was as Jha'dur had figured, her brother had found something interesting and was spending all of his time viewing it.

"Yes, what is it that you've found brother?" The small device was opened before Jha'dur's eyes and a fully holographic image began to play. The script on the screen and the words that were played by the device were Terran_ English_; fortunately for her, she had taken the time to learn the language. "_Modern Marvels,_ what manner of showing is this Sha'dur?" The show had a somewhat catchy tune and a baritone male announcer was talking about military craft from Terra's past.

"This is incredible sister! This device plays a holographic show, but can also do a whole bunch of other things as well…" Jha'dur held up a hand to stop her brother from getting too excited. "Just tell me the short part of it Sha'dur." At that, Sha'dur looked sheepishly at his sister, "I don't know exactly what the device is or what exactly it does, but it plays a form of entertainment from Terra. This particular show is from what the Terran's call their History Channel and this particular program, at least from what the Brakiri trader told me, is fairly popular due to how they present historical events or equipment."

"What's the title of the show?" Jha'dur was intrigued to know more of the enigmatic Terrans. "Like I said before, _Modern Marvels_" replied Sha'dur as he looked crossly at his sister. "Let me turn it up a bit more so we can both hear it…"

_Throughout history humanity has learned to rely on a large manner of tools. The _sapience_ of our species came through the use of tools. The use of tools led to our development of newer and newer technologies. Today on _Modern Marvels_ we discuss the implications of antigravity devices and their impact on modern technology that we know today. Modern antigravity devices allow us to move heavy objects without any effort or create a null space where gravity is nullified even in a gravity well. Antigravity had its start during the Second World War where it was used to good effect as the propulsion effect on USNA tanks and suborbital craft._

"Wait a second there Sha'dur, pause it." Once the screen images were paused, Jha'dur spoke again "They had antigravity capable tanks and ships when we were at the stage of moving them across the ground. Len'char thinks that he really knows what they can do? This is madness! They have to have more than this… didn't our intelligence arm show that they jointly developed a cruiser with the Centauri?" Sha'dur took a moment to look away from the video playback device and started to rummage around in a cabinet overflowing with similar playback devices. "Aha, here it is! Here is the one that was released by the Centauri and the Terrans; it's called the _Hyperion_ or _Morado_ depending on who is talking about it, they call the ship a 'triumph of modern engineering' or something like that."

"Jha'dur, why is this so important for you?" "You see little brother; I always thought that the Terrans were just like us in the beginning. Now I really don't know what to think about them. Their own history seems so contradictory, but they've been in space for as long as we have been or even longer than us. They fought the Centauri to a standstill more than a century ago and even subdued the Drazi for a short while. They have massive spacestations and separate Jump Gates and yet they're friendly enough to trade with anyone. I don't think that we've truly seen what they're capable of doing and I'm afraid that Len'char has poisoned the minds of the other Warmasters that the Terrans will fall like the rest of the League. If the Supreme Warmaster wills it, I'll go to war with the First Ones themselves, but I know that it is wrong brother." Both Jha'dur and Sha'dur took a moment to ponder the changes to their reality as the show continued to show multiple instances of antigravity powered Terran craft while their own ancestors had to make due with chemically powered rifles and primitive armored vehicles…

***-EH-***

**New Earth  
1****st**** Ring World Complex  
Terran Hegemony  
October 12, 2230**

The main naval base and fleet yard of the 1st Fleet was bustling with a large number of ships moving around in anticipation of possible action. No orders had been delivered, but the veteran crews were in a heightened state of readiness when the action would happen. Currently the 2nd Squadron of the 1st Fleet was just moving away from the main dock and began maneuvers to exit the fleet dock. Composed of the _Avenger_ class Fleet Carrier _THS Commodore Harold Desmonds_; a pair of _Hyperion_ class Cruisers, the _THS Persephone_ and the _THS Laertes_; and escorting each ship is a pair each of _Olympus_ Destroyers the _THS Ottawa, Olympia, Rio de Janeiro, San Diego, Houston,_ and _Moscow._

As the ships of the 2nd Squadron of the 1st Fleet continue to move into battle formation for a jump into hyperspace, a pair of _Clippers_ made the transition from hyperspace with new orders for the 1st Fleet. The 2nd Squadron returned to dock and the entirety of the 1st Fleet received new orders from Fleet Command. The _THS Persephone_ with the escorting _THS Rio de Janeiro_ and _THS San Diego_ were detached from the 2nd Squadron for extended operations through League of Non-Aligned Worlds space toward where the Dilgar began their attacks on the League. Their first stop would be the Independent Trade world of Tirrith then they would be heading a bit deeper into League space until they met the Dilgar front. The entirety of the 1st Fleet gave the detached Flotilla 12.1 a true sendoff (and many wished that they could in the same situation) before going back to their daily drills.

***-EH-***

_**THS Persephone  
**_**En-route to LONAW space**

The crews of the _Persephone, Rio de Janeiro, _and the _San Diego_ were all going through simulations or were enjoying some relaxation time. Captain DeVierre of the _Persephone_ was looking through a number of reports of Dilgar operations and drilling Commander Philips with some intercepted data sent through by the _Shadow Hunter_ that had been dispatched ahead of his own ship. The Explorer Command had also sent a ship, but the most recent reports were that it had not found much of anything and it was heading back to examine Sigma 957 for some more traces of the mysterious Walkers there. The reports so far had been that the Dilgar fleet was planning on staging out beyond their initial conquests of the Abbai and now were looking at the Drazi worlds near to them.

"It looks like we'll be at Tirrith shortly Commander. Have the troops go through another quick launch drill for our fighter squadrons and I'd like to see if maintenance can get the number six PIUC turret from freezing when it swivels more than forty five degrees at a time." Taking down the notes, Commander Philips nodded to her Captain. "Right away Captain, last I heard from maintenance was that they planned to have the number six turret all set before we get to Tirrith." "Excellent news Commander, I'll be in my ready room. Let me know once we arrive in-system."

The planned training operation went through without a problem and the two fighter squadrons onboard the _Persephone_ took some time to go through simulators to see exactly what the _Thorun_ could do compared to their _Tigers_. More than a few pilots wished that they were in the newly designed _Novas_, but they were only set to go to Carrier Squadrons first and then to Cruiser Squadrons. As the pilots twisted and turned, they all had their thoughts on what would happen when they first saw the Dilgar… Would it be through gunsights or with a hand outstretched in friendship? Time would tell and the Terran ship crew certainly didn't want to disappoint the Dilgar if they came in anything but peace.

***-EH-***

**Tirrith  
Independent Trade System  
November 1, 2230**

Space around Tirrith was quickly filling up as refugee ships from Abbai worlds began to show up after the Dilgar attacked their homeworld. Other League ships were also present there over Tirrith as the planet had just been party to a meeting of the League Council and a number of merchants were also present here. An older model Centauri ship was present representing one of the more trade minded Noble Houses and was currently at odds with a full Brakiri squadron of ships in an opposite orbit. Several _Clippers_ could also be seen at various places over Tirrith and those ships received more than their fair share of scandalous/jealous looks from other traders who had to make due with older non-jump capable ships.

It was into this atmosphere of tenseness that the _Persephone_ and her escorts (the _Rio de Janeiro_ and _San Diego_) jumped in unaware of what might happen. Just prior to jumping into the system, making use of their "standard" jump engine instead of the more advanced phase shift drive, the pair of Destroyers deployed several surveillance probes to keep an "eye" on the Jump Gate and hyperspace around Tirrith. Noticing the Terran-made _Clippers_, Captain DeVierre smiled to himself and clued in his First Officer to his joke. "Did you happen to notice the _Barbells_ on our way in Commander Philips?" Taking a look at her command station, she noticed them amongst the various League ships. "I did indeed Captain, looks like their loaded to bear." Not surprising given where they were located at the moment. "Captain, I also noticed that there's a whole lot more merchant shipping that appear to be carrying passengers." "By my guess Commander, I would say that they're from Abbai space and they're fleeing from the Dilgar.

As the Captain of the _Persephone_ took a moment for some banter with his First Officer, a jump point opened into the Tirrith system. "Looks like the jump point is from Abbai space Captain," was said by the officer manning the sensor station. "Two larger ships, perhaps Destroyers or Cruisers, and escorted by a trio of smaller ships in their pentacan formation."

"Sensors, are we being targeted?"  
"No sir, not at the moment, but the ships are sweeping toward the passenger ships."  
"Keep an eye on them and alert the _Rio_ and _San Diego_ to go to Condition 2."

With those words, flight crews and gunnery crews began moving to their stations. For the gunnery crew for the sixth PIUC turret, they were relieved that maintenance had time to go out and fix the traverse mechanism on their turret. The problems that they were having could be fatal in combat. _Tigers_ were set on their launch cradles and the pilots were set to go with standard warloads of a pair of graviton missiles under their fuselage and a quartet of the smaller mini-graviton missiles carried one apiece under each wing. Missile bays on the _Hyperion_ and the _Olympus_ class ships opened as well and the captains made certain that their main particle cannons were ready to fire.

As the Dilgar pentacan moved through space, they arrowed in towards the freighters near the passenger ships and began to open fire discriminately hitting both passenger ships and merchantmen. On the _Persephone_ and her escorts, the Terran crews were filled with horror and rage at the blatant act. As the Brakiri squadron opened a jump point and fled, the remaining League ships began to run towards the Jump Gate trying to escape from the system.

Onboard the _San Diego_, the remote sensor technician noted to his Captain that there was incoming on the Jump Gate. This information was relayed quickly across the BattleNet software on the Terran ships. Just before the fleeing League ships could get the Jump Gate, it activated sending another Dilgar pentacan right in front of the Gate blockading it. Seeing this, the _San Diego_ reported in to the _Persephone_ for permission to relieve the civilian shipping. "_San Diego_ you are cleared to support the civilian shipping, but do not open fire on the Dilgar ships, I repeat do not fire on the Dilgar ships. We aren't here to start a fight with the Dilgar. _Persephone _Actual out."

Relaying messages to the League ships, the _San Diego_ began moving towards the orbital areas of Tirrith. In-system patrol ships and a pair of Cruisers of the local defense fleet also began moving towards the first Dilgar pentacan, but had little chance of victory against the larger and better gunned ships. The civilians were in a panic as Dilgar _Thoruns_ began to dive through their formations sowing terror as they indiscriminately began to fire on the merchantmen. It was only from the few _Clippers_ that a resistance was mounted, but several of the ships had their HELP systems damaged when they panicked and fired them continually at the Dilgar fighters.

As the _San Diego_ arrived on station, she was immediately fired upon by one of the Dilgar Destroyers. Her Interceptor Grid was more than up to the task and no immediate damage was reported to the Terran ship. Keeping the _Olympus_ Destroyer between the Dilgar ships and the League ships was hard enough with the League ships continually jockeying for position behind the Terran ship. The _Rio de Janeiro_ was sent over to assist, but the appearance of another Terran ship caused the entire Dilgar pentacan to open fire. Their bolters proved to be of little use against the Interceptor Grid on both Terran ships. After close to a minutes' worth of Dilgar fire, the _Persephone's_ Captain made a momentous decision: "To all ships, this is Captain DeVierre, open fire. I repeat, open fire!"

All hell broke loose on the Dilgar.

Once the order was given, both the _Rio_ and _San Diego_ maneuvered to bring their spinal mounted Battle Laser to bear on the two largest Dilgar ships, their Destroyer-analogues. As the two Terran warships used their more powerful gravitic drives to move the nose of each ship onto their opposite number, missiles were being loaded into the forward launch tubes and the PIUC turrets began to swing towards the smaller ships in the pentacan. With the BattleNet onboard both ships highlighting targets that were locked onto already, the system prevented any of either ship's prodigious amount of firepower from being "wasted" on the same target. With a blast of orange particles, the Battle Lasers on both ships fired at a single ship apiece. As the particle cannons struck their targets, both Dilgar ships were nearly holed through by the powerful blast. Secondary impact points from the Ultramatter Cannons on both ships rendered the Dilgar ships combat ineffective while the pulsed ion fire took out the other three smaller ships in a storm of fire.

For the _Persephone_, she was far from idle, once Captain DeVierre gave his order to open fire on the Dilgar fleet; his own ship was maneuvering towards the other Dilgar formation by the Jump Gate. Composed in a similar formation as to the first pentacan that came into the Tirrith system, the two Dilgar Destroyers were destroyed in a like manner as the wing mounted Battle Lasers put them out of the fight. Ultramatter Cannon rounds and salvoes of ion pulses removed the smaller ships and further damaged the two larger Dilgar ships.

In the surprise of the Terran attack on the Dilgar, none of the attendant ships in the Tirrith system noticed when the _Persephone_ began launching her fighters. Dilgar _Thoruns_ continued in their attack runs, but cautiously as several of the _Clippers_ had already downed several of their number. It came as a complete surprise to them when they were attacked by a larger force of Terran fighters. Quickly the Terran _Tiger_ pilots launched off singles and pairs of mini-graviton missiles at the Dilgar fighters taking out several of them before they even noticed the Terran fighters. A fast and furious dogfight erupted as the slightly more maneuverable _Thorun_ squared off against the more heavily armored and armed Terran _Tiger_.

Watching from the main tactical display on the _Persephone_, Captain DeVierre watched silently as the last of the Dilgar ships were either destroyed or left drifting in space. He knew that his decision to attack the Dilgar would not be taken well by the HAF Navy Admiralty, but he also knew that attacking refugee ships were anathema as well. A quick message was sent to the HAF High Command informing them of coming under attack by the Dilgar and that he was returning fire. Turning back, Captain DeVierre realized that the attacks had finished during his communications attempt with the High Command.

"This is Captain DeVierre to all League ships, if you want to get out of here, follow the _San Diego_ out when she opens her jump point. If you are unable to do so, you will need to abandon your ships since the Dilgar will be on the way back to this system." Unable and unwilling to listen to the various League races and their excuses, Captain DeVierre was surprised when he heard from the two Markab ships that were in system when they requested to join the formation. Relations with the Markab was better for the Hegemony, ever since they had helped to cure the drafa plague, but joint military exercises were still an unknown for him. "Commander Philips coordinate with the Markab and have them escort out the rest of the League ships. Send to the _San Diego_ as well to coordinate with them and have the _Rio_ provide support as well to get out as many ships as possible. Send the 2nd Fighter Squadron with them as well for additional support." "Aye Captain, sending over now to all parties."

Looking at the main repeater display, specifically the display showing hyperspace, a large disturbance was showing up. "Captain, it looks like we have a large Dilgar fleet moving towards the planet." Captain DeVierre looked at the display and began forming a possible battleplan. "Send to the _San Diego_ and _Rio_ to launch all of their anti-mine missiles to where the Dilgar fleet is set to make their transition. Schedule a time on target barrage for all of our fighters as well. Once everyone has magnum launched their missiles execute the primary plan already discussed."

With those words, each _Olympus_ Destroyer launched out their main graviton missiles and their specialty missiles. The specialty missiles lacked a targeting system and carried a brace of mini-graviton warheads since they were used for mine clearance. Some captains had found that combining the mine clearance missiles with "standard" missiles could create a confluence area that could interdict a craft coming into normal space from hyperspace. Both Destroyers launched all of their mine clearance missiles and rippled off their external missile bays. The _Tigers_ added in the pair of missiles each as they moved either toward the Destroyers or back to the _Persephone_ while the _Persephone _added her missile complement to the barrage as well.

For those few League ships remaining behind before they could escape into hyperspace, they were treated to a view of a massive missile swarm being launched at a point in space and all of them wondered 'why are they doing that?' For those who could still see before their ships went through the jump point they were treated to the sight of multiple jump points opening and discharging Dilgar ships that promptly ran into the missile swarm fired by the Terran ships. Pentacans were shattered as multiple phased gravitic (graviton) missiles detonated in and around their formations. Ships were thrown into a panic before Warmaster Jha'dur herself brought them to heel with exhortations about their place as Dilgar soldiers.

"Warmaster, we have a single ship moving towards us at a high rate of speed. They're firing at us as well." Surprise was in Captain Anj'ash's voice as she watched the unknown ship move toward the Dreadnought Pentacan that surrounded the _Conqueror_, the personal flagship of the Warmaster Jha'dur. She couldn't fathom why the ship was moving so quickly towards them, especially since so many of the leading ships had already been damaged or destroyed by the missile salvo that had met them as they transitioned from hyperspace. "Pull yourself together Captain and prepare the ship for combat." "Yes Warmaster…" after a short pause, "your ship is ready for combat."

For Captain DeVierre, his thoughts were on the nearly suicidal maneuver he was about to attempt. The _Rio _and _San Diego_ had both escaped into hyperspace with a large number of League ships and the 2nd Fighter Squadron, while the 1st Squadron had already made it safely onboard. The missiles had done their job well enough and the Dilgar were scattered; at least most of them, a single pentacan of Dreadnoughts remained in his path. Putting his ship on a high speed run towards the Dilgar formation, he concentrates the Battle Lasers on the center ship while using his PIUC turrets and remaining missiles on the escorting ships. His Interceptor Grid continually took down or deflected the Dilgar weapons fire and allowed him to get even closer still to the Dilgar pentacan.

To the astonishing eyes of the Dilgar, the smaller ship now identified as a Terran _Hyperion_ manages to disable the Warmaster's ship as the other dreadnoughts are also heavily damaged from pin-point strikes. To make worse, the Terran ship appears to be on a collision course as it steadily moves toward the Warmaster's ship. One of the dreadnoughts tries and fails to get in the path of the Terran ship, but it is moved out of the way by a wave of gravitic force. At the last moment, the Terran ship disappears into a Jump Point that it opened directly on the _Conqueror_ and sent the remains of the ship careening into what remained of Jha'dur's 1st Strike Fleet.

***-EH-***

_**THS Persephone  
**_**En-route to Terran Hegemony space**

Heaving a sigh of relief, Captain DeVierre wiped sweat off his brow. His gamble had paid off and with his ship now on the path back to his escorts, they could rejoin the rest of the 1st Fleet. He did wonder what his actions would cause or if war would erupt, but he could not in good conscience leave those civilians to be destroyed. He was quiet and contemplative on the journey back to Terran space. He may well have stopped the Dilgar here, but he was certain that they would be back and soon…

**AN**: The crew of the _Persephone_ came from the Lord of Misrule's (or Lightning Count) excellent story about the Dilgar War. If you get a chance, I heartily recommend reading this epic. The only difference is that my Terrans have better ship designs, but the same can-do spirit as the original. I'm in the process of fleshing out some more technical readouts for the various ships seen thus far, so keep an eye out on my profile page for them.


	13. You Want to Do What?

**AN**: This chapter fought me the whole way (hence why it is coming out so late) and I missed my usual posting date (on the past Friday). Instead, I decided to expand the chapter out for everyone. Included at the bottom is the technical specification of the _Babylon Stations_ that I have mentioned a few times already. It appears at the end of this chapter.

**Chapter 12 You Want to Do What?**

**Omelos  
Dilgar Imperium  
November 3, 2230**

Shock was the emotion at the moment that was felt by the survivors of Jha'dur's 1st Strike Fleet after the fleet action at Tirrith. They had been expecting an "easy" campaign against the Free Trade world's police forces and those few merchantmen in the area. Instead they suffered a loss that was unheard of at the time for the Imperium. Worse still for them was that the ships heavily damaged in combat had been some of their largest and most capable warships. Forced to concede that their warships were lacking against the Terrans had many of the assembled Warmasters reconsidering their opinions of the Terrans they previously held.

For Len'char, he was delighted to see Jha'dur humbled, but he was also frightened by the Hegemony having a more powerful fleet than even what he envisioned them having. Having that information rubbed in his face made him even angrier to see that "justice" could be done for his wounded pride. Too many of the other Warmasters were starting to question his intelligence briefings and even more if he could be wrong about the Terrans, it was equally likely that he could be wrong about the other races. His position in the Warmaster's Council was shaky at the best of times and the disastrous showing of the Dilgar fleet at Tirrith made his position even more precarious.

For Jha'dur, her ship had been disabled in space and she had to deal with the ignominy of having to be rescued from the shattered remains of her _Conqueror_. The time she had due to the Terran attack on her fleet had given her time to contemplate her position and her previous thoughts on the Terrans. The show she and her brother had watched had given her pause, but seeing the capabilities of the Terran ships firsthand had certainly given her pause and a bit of admiration for them. Thinking that the Centauri had much the same ship designs, she realized that they would be equally dangerous to take on and everything possible should be put into diplomacy for these two races.

The Warmaster's Council was doing a good bit of thinking and they had come to the realization that they could take one of two paths: 1) they could antagonize the Terrans into full scale war or 2) they could sue for peace. The faction led by the Strike Fleet commanders were leaning more towards the last option as they knew that only three ships had done so much damage, but they also knew that it had been as a surprise. How the Terrans could detect their ships in hyperspace filled more than a few of the Strike Fleet commanders with dread and didn't like the thought of another trap like the one at Tirrith. The other faction that felt that they could take on the Terrans was led by the head of Intelligence Len'char and they felt that a swift decisive strike against the Terrans would be the best way to deal with them.

The factions continued to spar verbally, but when it came to blows between the factions, Supreme Warmaster Gar'shan stopped them from escalating with a sharp call. "You're nothing but a bunch spoiled children fighting over a sandwich. Show some decorum here. There will be nothing done that is not approved by the Warmasters." Unfortunately for Gar'shan, there were those there who were already planning on disobeying him. Their thoughts were on the possible future glory that they would get or on revenge. Len'char knew that being the suspected "ring-leader" could get him killed if they failed, but the rewards were very sweet to contemplate. Very sweet indeed…

***-EH-***

**Len'char's Quarters  
Omelos  
Dilgar Imperium**

"Good, good, you're all here now." Len'char looked out over the faces of his subordinates and fellow Warmasters who felt as he did in the ascendancy of the Dilgar race. These upstart Terrans would pay for perfidy and their actions at Tirrith would come to haunt them. Len'char smiled cruelly as he thought of what he might do with a few captured Terrans, but the clearing of a throat nearby caused him to come back to reality.

"It is all well and good that you've brought us all here as part of a conspiracy Len'char, but what plans do you actually have?" Warmaster Leo'jash was well respected in the Imperium, but he did not have the same flair for combat and command like Jha'dur or her brother Sha'dur. In fact it was his sister who served as the aide for Jha'dur and her primary ship captain.

"All will be revealed by friends." Such a sentiment by Len'char made many of those present look around as an alien, of a species that was unknown to all present, appeared before them. It walked with a perpetually shrouded countenance and made many of those in attendance wary of the figure. "This my friends is a friend of the Imperium, Kas'Vaka is an emissary from the Drakh. The Drakh have pledged much to aid us in our endeavors against the League and have provided us with some weaponry that we can make use of in our expected campaign against the Terrans. They have also sent to us several of their own technicians to aid us in integrating some of what we've taken from the League."

"Len'char you can't be serious in accepting aid from an alien race!" Others in attendance rose up in anger and with a furor as well. Len'char let them vent for a few moments and let them die down as they all realized that he was not moved by their arguments. "Where exactly will you find the Terrans? Where are their worlds? Can we stand against their technology? With the aid of these Drakh we can take them on and find their worlds. First we'll strike at one of their precious _Babylon Stations_ and once we have captured it, we will be in a good position to strike against their worlds." Len'char seemed to bask in the silence after his questions before he leaned forward and began to lay out his plans.

Hours went by as the various Warmasters and officers debated the final details, but it appeared that _Babylon Station 5_ at Sorith would be their objective. Equipment would be moved to near the Drazi border prior to the strike to hide the fleet elements. Aid from the Drakh in the form of weaponry and sensors would prove instrumental against the Terrans. The disruption of cargo and the attack against the station would be a blow against the myth of the Terrans' invulnerability.

***-EH-***

_**THS Persephone  
**_**En-route to New Earth**

Captain DeVierre for the fifth time since his encounter with the Dilgar was going over his ship's performance in battle. He could see that his ship was more than capable of combat with a variety of foes and the latest just proved that point, but he also knew that the short battle would have dire repercussions for the Hegemony. A quick message following the fleet action had been sent to the High Command, but all too little was left aside in view of sending a quick message versus a longer more involved one. He knew that he would be taken to task for opening fire on the Dilgar, even if they had fired upon his ships first. In some ways he felt as if his survival should not have happened at all, but brushed aside that concern as "survivor's guilt."

The crew of the _Persephone_ was in good spirits and after bringing the 2nd Fighter Squadron back aboard; the pilots found time to swap stories and to compare kill counts from their brief action. The more agile _Thorun_ proved to be a surprise for the pilots, but several of them wondered what the Dilgar would think when they had a chance to tangle with one of the newer _Novas_. Both the _Rio_ and _San Diego_ also reported good spirits among the crew and both captains were currently involved in writing up a report on their innovative use of the anti-mine munitions in an actual combat situation. All told, spirits were at an all-time high, but the crews were well aware of what might happen when they arrived back at New Earth.

Even though spirits were high, the chance that they could be court martialed was an ever present possibility and the fact that they had opened fire on a possible enemy (leaving aside the fact that they had been fired upon first) made them a bit reluctant to travel home as well. Still, they hadn't taken any losses in combat (aside from some expendables) and were able to escort the League races on to Cormac in the Brakiri Syndicarcy.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 3  
**_**Proxima Centauri**

David Sheridan for the tenth time wondered if the galaxy truly abhorred peace. The situation with the various League representatives as they argued over who was at fault for "letting" the Dilgar prosecute their war was driving him sparse. Worse still was the new situation when the _Persephone_ and her squadron was attacked by the Dilgar and the Terran captain, rightly at that, opened fire on the Dilgar fleet and even took out one of the Dilgar's top commanders. Pondering on why he was so hated brought him back to the current situation that he was dealing with at the moment: what to do about the Dilgar.

Luckily (or unluckily depending on the situation) for Ambassador Sheridan, a _Clipper_ had just arrived from Terra with specific orders for him. The representative carried with her a series of messages for the Ambassador and for the various trade officers present on the station. Unfortunately the messages also included a pair of missives that were not taken very well at all. The first missive was that the Dilgar would be sending one of their own representatives to _Babylon Station 6_ and that he would need to travel there to meet with them concerning the Terran attack on one of their fleets at Tirrith. The other missive was that his son John had been accepted as position with Bureau 13 in their fleet, which gave him some mixed feelings.

David's thoughts remained conflicted as he boarded the dedicated diplomatic _Clipper_ on the way to _Babylon Station 6_ for his meeting with the Dilgar's representatives. He wondered what the talks would result in for the Hegemony and what possible excuses that the Dilgar would use for their attack on a Terran ship. The complete footage from the BattleNet had been scrubbed of any distinguishing marks of the advanced Terran combat control system, but the footage hadn't lied that it was actually the Dilgar who had opened fire first. David wondered what concession he could get out of the Dilgar, but given their xenophobic views (not unlike the Ch'lonas); he wasn't expecting much from the talks. He idly wondered if he could have Bureau 13 cleanse Omelos like they had done to Ch'lon, but decided that he didn't want that event on his conscience… though it was mighty tempting at times.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 6  
**_**Sirius**

As David Sheridan's _Clipper_ ship transited through the Terran Jump Gate, he could see on the main display that a single Dilgar ship was present as well. He smiled a bit to himself as he could see from the traffic in system that all of the League merchants were keeping a wide berth from the Dilgar merchantman. The only ships nearby were HAF Navy Destroyers and while none of the Terran ships were overtly hostile, to his practiced eye he could see that both ships had their missile bays ready for rapid launch. 'Well that should make things interesting with the Dilgar.'

As the _Clipper_ docked near the diplomatic area, David Sheridan took a moment to compose himself and exited out to a well-appointed docking area. Waiting for him was the on-duty diplomatic attaché and several members of his staff. David gestured for them to continue on as he walked past the area to a waiting transport.

"What news do you have Glynn?"

Glynn Shepherd hated his job sometimes and today was one of those. He had the various League ambassadors, the second-tier ones at that, all angry that a Dilgar ship was even nearby to the station and he also had to deal with an ass of a Dilgar diplomat who was identified as a member of the Warmaster Council by Terran Intelligence.

"Nothing good sir. The League is up in arms over the Dilgar and the Dilgar's ambassador is an ass to everyone here. Nothing good to report at all."

"I know that's going to be an issue. I've read the briefing as well about Len'char and what I've read isn't good at all."

David Sheridan knew that his feelings on the issue shouldn't be a big point at all, but Len'char just seemed to rub everyone wrong and didn't seem to notice (or more likely didn't care). He knew that he would have a tough time getting anything from the Dilgar and Len'char would more than likely fight everything and draw out every possible situation. Knowing some of the reports coming from the League, David knew that any delays could see plenty of League citizens dead by the Dilgar Navy.

"Keep them fairly isolated and since we can't block his outgoing calls, set them to go through a redirect circuit."

"That's cruel David. It could take that message at least a day and a half to go through our network like that. We could face some issues from the League diplomats as well if we do that…"

"Don't worry Glynn; the trip will be something that we can discuss with Len'char and his group of diplomats. Leave the League diplomats to me. I'm sure they've heard from their superiors not to antagonize us, especially after what the _Persephone's_ group did to help their merchants get away from Tirrith."

The redirect circuit was a cruel joke when first tried out. It redirects a message through the entirety of the Hegemony's isolated diplomatic circuit and then back through the sending station and finally out to the intended recipient. First done as a joke, the capability remained available for those diplomats who breached decorum. The "excuse" given for the delay was that the "sender made a mistake" usually was not taken very well, but with no other recourse most chose to ignore the possible slight.

***-EH-***

_**THS Persephone  
**_**New Earth Emergence Zone**

Captain DeVierre smiled as his ship and the pair of Destroyers escorting him made the transition back to normal space using the phase shift drive system. The more "showy" jump drive was only used around the other races to keep them guessing about the Hegemony's level of development, especially in regard to military technology. His ship had done well enough against the Dilgar, but he knew that regardless of the result of the battle, both he and his crew would be subjected to numerous debriefings. A minor headache had formed as he thought about the countless inquiries into his actions; regardless of how justified they were in light of the situation. Thoughts quickly turned to the possible conflict/war with the Dilgar and Captain DeVierre took a moment to remember that he had signed up with the HAF to defend the Hegemony.

His thoughts remained in his mind as the _Persephone_ docked to the main repair bay at New Earth. He took a moment to gaze at the beautiful world nearby and smiled to himself at the sight of the first colonized world from Terra. His thoughts soon turned to the inquest that he would be attending next and the vague not knowing what would happen to him. His crew had been following his orders and he hoped that they would not have to deal with the inquest, but he also knew that the HAF Navy was a stickler for following orders.

As he finally entered the room for the inquest, he was surprised to see that Admiral Denisov was the only person in the room.

"Surprised to see me Captain DeVierre?"

"Yes Admiral, I am indeed to see only you here. I had thought that my inquest was scheduled for today."

"It was scheduled for today, but the Council of Lords felt that the situation was unique."

"I see sir," but Captain DeVierre really didn't understand the possible situation. The Council of Lords was the ruling body of the Hegemony. The Council had the top military commanders along with the Governor Generals of the major areas of the Hegemony, including the various Ring Worlds, and also had a seat for both Bureau 13 and the head of the HRAD. Most of the time on the Senate made a pronouncement, but if the Council was chiming in, it certainly did not bode well for him or his actions.

"I can see that you don't understand Captain and I am hear solely so that you know that the Council backs you fully for your actions over Tirrith. You sent the Dilgar a far stronger message of the Hegemony's intentions than any possible diplomatic action. Not only that, you highly embarrassed their premiere commander, Jha'dur. The Dilgar even got a bit of false information since your ship still carried the older _Tiger_ and not the newer _Nova_ as part of your fighter complement. All told, you have done well Captain. Take the time we're giving you for some R&R, but be forewarned that we have big plans for you and the rest of the 1st Fleet. Big plans indeed…"

Captain DeVierre saluted Admiral Denisov and both men left the conference room, but Captain DeVierre kept thinking about what the Admiral had just told him and wondered what he meant when he had talked about "big plans."

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 6  
**_**Sirius**

David Sheridan had his first look at Len'char of the Dilgar Imperium and wasn't really shocked or horrified by his appearance. The demonization by the various League ambassadors had David looking for horns or other indicators of Len'char's possible demonic roots, but he had found nothing to indicate that possible position. What he did find though was that Len'char had a major stick up his ass. He wanted to observe every nuance of diplomacy to the nth degree and that was starting to wear on David's sensibilities. It almost reminded him of an old movie… _Mr. Smith Goes to Washington_, that's it! It seemed like Len'char was emulating a Terran senator trying to do a filibuster, but only had an old movie to base his acting on.

After about the tenth attempt by Len'char to derail the discussion, David had enough.

"The Terran Hegemony is strongly opposed to this matter Mr. Len'char. We do not take kindly to obviously aggressive actions against our Navy ships. Your ships fired first, we have the full battle footage showing that our ships endured over a minute of continuous fire from your ships before they responded, after showing great restraint on their part. We've sat here for the better part of a week while you attempt to go through the political and social niceties, but you have said little to support your claims. Did your ships or did they not fire on Terran Navy ships? Do remember Ambassador, that we have footage from several races including the Centauri that show your actions for all present here."

All throughout the harangue by David Sheridan, Len'char's expression remained fixed, but it could be seen that he had lost his temper as well. When accused of stringing along the discussion, he for a brief moment appeared to grow pale, but his trademark look of scorn came back full force.

"The Dilgar Imperium is obviously not at fault here Mr. Sheridan! We were simply engaged in a police action above Tirrith."

"Oh, is that what the Dilgar call attacking refugee ships?"

The seemingly flippant remark by David Sheridan caused Len'char to grimace and he knew at that moment that his position was untenable. Len'char chose to take up another tack in the discussion.

"Is it possible that the Hegemony has no true reason for their actions at Tirrith either? No, I do think they were planning on attacking the Dilgar Imperium anyway, but you didn't have a chance to do anything against us directly, so you used your League allies to attack us instead. How much of a cowardly race you must be using other species to attack your foes to provoke them."

Len'char smiled inwardly that his viewings of multiple Terran movies had not been in vain. His original mission of viewing the interior spaces of a Terran _Babylon Station_ had been accomplished with the two week long series of negotiations. That he was able to keep the Terrans busy for so long caused him to remember his original stance against the Terrans and he felt vindicated in his decision to work with the Drakh. He hoped that he would have time to enjoy some time on Omelos before he went to the staging area for his newly formed Strike Fleet for the attack on the _Babylon Station_ at Sorith. Len'char smiled at David Sheridan a toothy smile and gave him a brief nod of his head that caused David to look up in surprise. To this Len'char motioned that he was ending his comments and that the floor was open for the Terrans to take up the discussion.

David Sheridan held surprise at the words of Len'char, even more so since they basically ended the discussion for quite some time. He knew that this situation would happen, especially since he also knew that the Dilgar were stalling for something. Terran Intelligence had not noticed anything overt done by the Dilgar contingent, but the Kirishiac sensors had shown several cloaked figures following the Dilgar around. They were easily spotted by the sensors and once found, they had been followed discretely by station security. No bombs or listening devices had been found, but the Dilgar could have hidden anything along with them in their quarters in the diplomatic section. Until the Dilgar left, the quarters would not be searched; the Hegemony did abide by their agreements after all.

"If that is the opinion of the Dilgar Imperium, then they are certainly welcome to it. However, this discussion should only be open to the facts. The Terran Hegemony has footage of Dilgar vessels opening fire on registered refugee ships without any provocation. They were unarmed ships and they were openly slaughtered in open space rather than in Dilgar space. The Terran Hegemony also has full footage that has confirmed and verified by the Centauri of Dilgar Imperium ships opening fire on HAF Navy ships without provocation as well. If the position of the Dilgar Imperium is to sweep this matter under the table and to ignore it, I have the full backing of the Terran Senate to end this discussion. Mr. Len'char, you may take your aides and leave Terran space forthwith" and David couldn't help himself when he added, "and don't let the door hit you on the ass when you leave."

The looks of shock all around, most especially from the League's diplomats, would have been funny had the situation not been so serious. Even the Dilgar were shocked at the frank words spoken by the Terrans. When David Sheridan had looked right at the Spectre to Len'char's left when he said aides, they all began to panic inside. If the Terrans could detect the Spectres with their cloak, what else could they do as well? Len'char chose that moment to stand up and give his rebuttal:

"Very well, we take leave of you now. Be warned that the Dilgar Imperium does not brook any attacks from the Terrans and we will remember this action."

With those words, the Dilgar left the station and soon enough their merchantman also left the Sirius system.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Staging Area  
Location unknown**

Kas'vaka looked out over the finished hull of a _Sekhmet_ Cruiser that was built using his expertise and that of his compatriots. The reverse-engineering done to produce the ship had taxed even the knowledge of his species and that of his masters to get finished, but now the new ship would get a good workout against the Terrans. What little he knew of the Terrans had come through other sources and what he knew was mostly conjecture. They had not proven to be like other races in their worship of the Ancients. In fact, he had seen a documentary that the Terrans had produced that actually had the true form of the Vorlons shown and very few outside the Hegemony had believed it, but he knew that it was the truth. That the Terrans had not been seeded with telepathy was a bit surprising to him and the thought terrified him a bit as well.

The new ships being put together for the Dilgar were another sign of their burgeoning relationship and Kas'vaka hoped that things would be better this time around instead of the failure of the Orieni to do much against the Centauri. His help there had been wasted when the Vorlon worshippers had attacked his homeworld and forced the Drakh to flee to other worlds and the homeworld of his masters. He wondered for a brief moment if he should be happy that he was out here instead of on Omelos like Salasine, but passed off his uneasiness as being so far away from his adopted homeworld.

Thoughts of his new homeworld made him think of his original homeworld, now destroyed by Orieni for close to a century. His Masters were beneficent though to his race and he was more than happy to be here than elsewhere. His work suited him well instead of being used as a grunt or warship crewman, neither of which he thought would be a best use of his talents. Talents that were currently taxed trying to integrate the widely different technology for the Dilgar's newest ship design.

Gazing out once more from the viewport on the spacestation, Kas'vaka watched as a jump point opened and a single Dilgar warship came through. '_That must be Len'char_' thought Kas'vaka. Soon enough the warship released a shuttle and the shuttle quickly docked with the station. The Drakh watched as Len'char barged into the viewing space seething with rage. Evidently the Terrans must have seen through his ruse and expelled him from their space. That brought up an interesting point for Kas'vaka as it was apparent that the Terrans could also see through the cloaking field that the Spectres used as well. It could be very likely that they could see his true form and would not have any problems with the ECM suite on the _Sekhmet_. That could spell trouble for when the ship was used in combat for the first time.

"Ah Kas'vaka, I assumed that I would find you here. How goes the construction of the other ships?" Len'char tried to keep his tone light, but the recent humiliation by the Terrans had unsettled him, especially the veiled comment about his hidden guards. How the Terrans could see the Spectres would haunt him for quite some time.

"Yes, the ships are soon to be completed. We have integrated both League technology and some special systems from my own masters for your use. The hardest part was integrating in the more advanced lasers from the Hyach with the shields from the Abbai, but both systems are functioning. To give you some redundancy, we have included bolters in this ship as a backup for the more advanced systems should they not work correctly. Your ship also has a surprisingly large fighter complement; I assume that you're trying to emulate the Terrans with their _Hyperion_ design?"

"Yes, we were surprised by how many fighters they were able to pack into their ships and it made them almost a mini-carrier. Good to know that the ships will be ready for our attack on Sorith and the Terran's battlestation there."

The Terran _Babylon Station 5_ would suffer for their assault on the Dilgar at Tirrith and Len'char thought back to his time on _Babylon Station 6_ and hoped that the interiors would not be too dissimilar. His time spent there would be best spent as he entered the station as a conquering leader and not on the front lines. He had plenty of Dilgar who would want to lead this assault so that he would not have to be with them. With these new ships leading the way, the five parts of the Strike Fleet should not have any problems taking out the station. Aside from a few defensive satellites and some patrolling fighters, he saw nothing else there to show that each station was defended in any way.

Kas'vaka watched as Len'char went over his plans for his attack on the Terran battlestation. The plan was ambitious, but that was not surprising knowing the Dilgar leader. The simple fact that so many ships could be relegated to this enterprise spoke poorly of the Dilgar's central leadership or more highly upon Len'char's ability to move personnel and equipment around as he wanted. The simple fact that so few of the Dilgar's other Warmasters even had an inkling of this operation should be enough to allow Len'char to ascend to the Supreme Warmaster position easily and with him the Drakh would have more influence on the Dilgar. They could easily be the "hand of chaos" his masters so loved to cultivate.

Waiting and watching was all that remained for the Drakh as the final ships were finalized and production ceased, but these shipyards would be useful for when his masters start to awaken. He just had to bide his time until that happened and then and only then would his service be rewarded. Kas'vaka remained happy that he had this kind of duty instead of babysitting Techno-Mages like some of his contemporaries.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 2  
**_**Former Ch'lon space**

As the technician looked through the gun camera footage from the _Persephone_, she took note of the Dilgar tactics and the equipment used on their ships. It looked to be particle weaponry with some lasers and a few plasma weaponry which the Interceptors were well able to shield against and the lasers appeared to be of minimal use. '_If that was the pride of the Dilgar fleet, did the HAF need the aid of B13?'_ It appeared to be the truth, but that was of little concern at the time and would need to be borne out by some more evidence.

The footage was passed through multiple hands before coming to the head of the Kirishiac remnant in Bureau 13. He saw a potential for the Dilgar to be a stalking horse for the Terrans, much like how the Centauri managed to force them forward far quicker than they would have done otherwise. It was by his approval that the latest in defensive technology would be sent to the various _Babylon Stations_ for protection. The upgrades included switching out the large Heavy PPC mounts with the latest Hypergraviton Cannons and Blasters and would be included with general upgrades for the Interceptor Grid. The new _Cotton Fleet Replenishment _ships would be sent with this cargo and would give them a chance to see if they could work as predicted. The newly produced _Marathon_ Battle Cruisers would be sent in pairs to each station as their new guard ships and would escort each of the _Cottons_.

Once the plan was sent to B13's Board of Directors, they quickly approved the idea, but amended it to update the Air Group at each station with the latest _Novas_ in place of their older _Tigers_. It would be a good test run as well for the new _Warlocks_ and would give the hyper aggressive captains a chance to test out their ships and allow them to carry their Air Group and replace the one at the _Babylon Stations_. All told, it would be very good for their bottom line when the HAF Navy saw how effective the new _Marathons_ could be as a defensive ship and the fighter load out of the _Warlocks_ when compared to the HAF Navy's _Avengers_.

Bureau 13's own fleet were a product of their work during the past century, known as the Golden Century, when they were allowed to form their own fleet due to their contribution of the _Constitution_ Frigates that saved the Hegemony against the Centauri. That their fleet had become even larger than before and they actually had a few in the HAF Navy who were angered that the secretive agency had a larger more advanced fleet than was "standard" for the Navy was just icing on the cake for the Bureau. Their own ships were the result of advanced technology and other systems that they had either sold to the Hegemony for deployment or the result of funding from numerous patents.

Orders were cut to send out a single _Warlock_ with their escorting _Artemis_ Frigates to each of the _Babylon Stations_. Further supplies would be sent out via a massive _Cotton_ tender and the supply ships would also be escorted by _Marathons_ that would then take up station at each of the _Babylon Stations_ as their defensive guard. The Kirshiac High Lord Ch'Lorna looked out as the convoys formed up and knew that it was good to see the Terrans moving on their own without their aid.

***-EH-***

_**THS Nemesis  
**_**En-route to **_**Babylon Station 5**_

Captain Joe Tennant smiled for a moment as he saw his most recent orders from Bureau High Command that he would be sent to _Babylon Station 5_ to switch out their current garrison of _Tigers_ with the newer _Novas_ that his _Warlock_ was currently carrying. He would also be "flying the flag" and it would show the various League ships the true might of the Hegemony. It would be good for him to see his "Uncle Sam" again, it had been a while since he had been on Novo Terra and "Uncle Sam" had a good deal to do since he had been posted as the Governor General of _Babylon Station 5_. Looking to his left, Joe saw that Commander Anderson was approaching with an update on the latest training cycle.

"Tell me the good news Commander. How did the crew do?"

"Well enough Captain, but the orbital crews need some more work to reacquire targets after they've taken them done."  
"Good, have those crews who have not done well enough to keep going through the simulations. I want the reacquisition of targets to be top priority, especially since our Hypergraviton Cannons are the only guns on this ship."

"Yes sir"

With those words, Command Anderson went to his main station on the bridge of the _Nemesis_. The _Nemesis_ was a Block 1 _Warlock_ and the large diamond shaped hull was studded with weapon emplacements. The biggest piece of advanced technology taken from the Kirishiacs was their orbital technology. Orbitals; both in the light, regular, or heavy varieties; carried a wide variety of weaponry and could actually undock with the main hull giving them an extremely wide arc of fire. Out of all the technology learned from the Kirshiacs, the orbital segments were perhaps the most important patented by Bureau 13. The twenty four orbitals (of the "regular" size) carried by the _Nemesis_ were set in a heavy weapons configuration of eighteen Hypergraviton Cannon capable orbitals and the remaining six were set with Gravitic Dissipaters/Augmentors. The increased protection of the extra Dissipaters was more than able to shield the ship from enemy weapons fire. Commander Anderson didn't think that it would be as much of a problem as their current mission was a "milk run."

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Station Strike Fleet  
En-route **_**Babylon Station 5**_

Len'char looked out through an armored viewport, one of those compromises that he had forced against the protests of his engineers, and saw the large fleet that had formed up around his personal _Sekhmet_ Cruiser. The large ship was what he considered to be at least, the best designed Dilgar ship. The irony was that very little of the ship's design as of Dilgar design; rather so much of it was pieced together from the best technology of the League's states. It was only through the assistance of the Drakh that the pieces of gear from the Abbai, Hyach, and the Shadows were forced together into a semblance of functionality.

All together, the large fleet began forming up around the five _Sekhmets_ that remained in the lead for their assault on the _Babylon Station_. Pentacans formed up around the larger _Sekhmets_ and missile pentacans came into position as well with the formations. All told, the new Station Strike Fleet numbered close to three hundred ships, though aside from the _Sekhmets_, the majority of the fleet was composed of smaller Frigates and Destroyers. The larger Dreadnoughts and Cruisers were sent to the main line Strike Fleets, but the smaller ships were in large supply and would not be missed. A decent number of fighters were included with the fleet, but they were limited due to the smaller ships present. Len'char knew that he would have to account for the ships, but he also knew that he could present a fait accompli if he took out the Terran battlestation.

The time spent on _Babylon Station 6_ had given him a decent understanding of the interior of the station and what his ships had recorded showed very little in the way of weaponry on the station. It was incredibly large, but the majority that was seen and scanned showed up as manufacturing areas in the middle and rear areas of the station. The opulence in the forward section showed the "softness" of the Terrans and Len'char knew that he would take great pride in taking in a group of fighters to destroy the interior and loot it.

As to the defensive fleet that could be present, Len'char had only seen at most thirty two fighters present and these were of the same type used against Jha'dur's fleet at Tirrith. While impressive, the station did not appear to have a large number of fighters and Len'char made the decision to double what he saw with what was carried by his own fleet. Sixty four _Thoruns_ would accompany his fleet and should be more than sufficient for the Terran battlestation. Even though Jha'dur's fleet of Dreadnoughts had been routed by a trio of Terran Navy ships, Len'char knew that his fleet of close to 300 ships would be enough to overwhelm whatever fleet came up against him.

As his thoughts were swirling around in his head, he could see the lead pentacan as it jumped into hyperspace. The secondary pentacans were all setup around a single Destroyer leading a group of Frigates since the smaller Frigates did not have their own jump drives. All Dilgar ships had made the transition to hyperspace and Len'char sent orders for the fleet to form up in combat formation as they made their transition to Sorith and before they could make their mark on the destiny of the Dilgar nation.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 5  
**_**Sorith**

Governor General Samuel Ishida took a few moments of spare time (all too brief when he could take them) to look at the interior of his command. He had come a long way from Novo Terra and though he was now over a hundred years old, his nanoware-infused body had at least another century before he would even contemplate retirement. His recent communique from Fleet Command that Bureau 13 was sending out ships to do a refit on his station had him cringing after he read which ship would be delivering new fighters to his station. He remembered Joe Tennant as a young man and if he kept the same personality, he may have to increase the number of MP's on his station when the _Nemesis_ docked for R&R.

Still, it might be a unique enough experience to see the latest ship produced by Bureau 13 and get a chance to see the new _Nova_ up close. He had a few chances to take out a _Tiger_ for when the League bureaucrats became troublesome and truly enjoyed the experience. The interior of his _Babylon Station_ had been modeled after the biosphere of Novo Terra at his request when he was given the posting. The League diplomats and traders were surprised by the large amount of water found on his station and even more so when they found that the water was stocked with a large number of flora and fauna from Terra's oceans. The archipelago found in the biosphere area made his station the one station that had a large number of tourists. The setup was so successful that he had two of his Inside out worlds in the system made in the same image. The other Inside out world was setup as an alpine wonderland as a good contrast to the rest of the system.

Looking at the main status board in the command section, Samuel watched as the third and fourth fighter squadrons docked amid some excitement. '_The pilots must be happy that they were going to get to rotate out on the _Nemesis.' With a full complement of 128 fighters (a full Terran Fighter Group), the _Babylon Station_ was well supplied with fighter support. That so few fighters were usually deployed as part of a CAP (Combat Air Patrol) tended to surprise those few League members who had become privileged to know more about Terran warfare doctrines (most notably the Markab).

The Ring World complex around _Babylon Station 5_ was well stocked with a complete defensive fleet for the station, but few knew that it existed. Only a short jump from the station, the Babylon Defense Fleet was formed in a similar manner as the Numbered Fleets so common in the HAF Navy. They trained incessantly to respond to any possible situation and kept their Cruiser-heavy Fleets on a ready standby (with a single Squadron always ready to respond while the other two were either standing down or in transit) in case of trouble.

"Governor General Ishida, we have contact with a large fleet moving toward the station."  
"Is it the _Nemesis_ and her fleet?"

"I can't tell sir as the ships have tripped the long distance beacons."

"Which direction for the beacons? They should be coming from Bureau 13's main base of operations."

"Standby Governor General…" the technician began typing away as he tried to access the sensor logs of the outer pickets. The outer pickets were built using "standard" jump technology and were identical to the Centauri design to keep outsiders from knowing the full capabilities of the Terran station. The middle set of pickets were of a more advanced design and featured a full ELINT capability that could fully identify ships, even those just moving through Terran space en-route to _Babylon Station 4_ at Epsilon Eridani or those ships en-route to _Babylon Station 3_ at Proxima.

"I've got the sensor logs from the middle pickets now…" images were brought up on the main holographic display and Dilgar profiles were noted. "Sir, we have Dilgar incoming!"

"Crap, recall all ships and relay a distress call to Fleet Command that we have a Dilgar Fleet incoming."

"Yes sir, message being relayed now to Fleet Command. I am also sending to the Bureau 13 network in case the _Nemesis_ and her fleet group are nearby also."

"Good work, now put me on the Public Address System."

Looking at the fleet of approaching ships, the powerful ELINT systems were slowly counting the ships heading their way. The system noticed that the lead ships were of a design that did not match the current Dilgar warbook on file. Governor General Ishida took this all in stride as he moved to the Public Address System's holographic camera array. He would need to make an announcement of the incoming fleet and he also needed to get his station prepared for battle. Very few people knew that the _Babylon Stations_ were mobile and had a decent armament, but they could be overwhelmed with such a large fleet. The armament was intended to deny the enemy any possible foothold and to keep them busy while the Babylon Defense Fleet came to their aid. It was questionable if the defense grid could keep the incoming fleet back or if they would be overwhelmed.

++_This is not a test of the Emergency Alert System. Please hold for an official announcement++_

"It is with a heavy heart that I bring this news to you, my fellow inhabitants of the _Babylon Station 5_. We are currently tracking a large Dilgar war fleet that is heading this way. All ships are to undock with the station and proceed to the coordinates being sent over to you by Traffic Control. The station is going into lock-down and I ask all of you to please obey the MP's on the station, they are here for your safety and will lead you to the appropriate shelters on the station. Remain calm and all will be done to keep you safe, you have my personal pledge on that…"

With a sigh, Governor General Ishida ended his broadcast, "We are at war. May God have mercy on the Dilgar, for we surely will not."

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Station Strike Fleet  
Sorith**

Len'char watched the red currents of hyperspace as it passed by his viewport and glanced at the monitor at his bridge station that showed that the fleet was only a few short minutes from what he considered to be the crowning moment of the war to date. As he saw the final beacon marker flash by; he turned to the captain of his personal _Sekhmet_, the _Mantis_, "Jump the fleet into normal space and have all ships move into an englobement maneuver around the station." Not even hearing the reply, Len'char returned to his monitor as the fleet made their jumps.

Multiple jump points opened and the mass of Dilgar ships came through in sharp formations. Len'char was surprised though that space around the station was calm. Normally each _Babylon Station_ was surrounded by a large mass of ships coming and going, but here nothing was present. As each of his ships released their fighters, Len'char could not begin to comprehend the number of Terran fighters that were currently being launched. He had to take a look at his monitor to truly believe the number of fighters that had been launched. He still didn't understand how the station had so many fighters, but he gave an order that had his lighter ships support the _Thoruns_ heading towards their opposite number in the Terran fleet.

As the Dilgar fleet took their combat positions, they had an awe-inspiring sight as the _Babylon Station_ began to maneuver and all of them saw panels moving all along the station's main axis. Not knowing what those panels concealed, the Dilgar fleet continued to their positions. As Len'char ordered his fleet to open fire, the _Babylon Station_ pre-empted his attack. Massive cannons began to move out of the station and they opened fire sending pulses of particle fire and large streams of solid rounds at the thin skinned Dilgar ships. Missiles erupted that made the display used against Jha'dur's 1st Strike Fleet look like a minor light show as multiple types streamed out from the station. The Dilgar fleet was struck by the enormous amount of firepower being deployed against them and the moment of stumbling caused many ships to be destroyed.

Many more ships took up position as the previously pristine forward elements were rendered down to lifeless husks that no longer resembled warships. A brief undercurrent of fear ran through the hearts and minds of the Dilgar fleet as they witnessed the initial assault from the Terran battlestation.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 5  
**_**Sorith**

Watching as the Dilgar ships erupted from multiple jump points would have had a comparable League Navy ready to surrender, but each point had been previously plotted by the advanced Terran sensors and nothing was a surprise for them. Each of the massive Heavy PPC mounts on the station differed from the "usual" mounting in that they had six barrels rather than the four usually found on HAF Navy ships. The larger coilgun assembly also fired a larger burst of shots and specialty munitions (especially antimatter) that was now being fired in anger. In addition to the Heavy PPC mounts, the _Babylon Station_ had a large number of missile bays that were not unlike that featured on the new _Sagittarius_ Missile Ships that held a large number of graviton missiles. Perhaps the most impressive main weapon was the largest coilgun in known space, the central 500 meter wide central shaft on the station. Very few people knew that the main elevator shaft was actually a coilgun and for the first time it would be used in combat.

As the jump points began disgorging Dilgar ships and before they could open fire, the _Babylon Station_ erupted in weapons fire. Taken by surprise, the Dilgar fleet suffered a large number of casualties in the opening seconds of combat. Missiles fired out as Heavy PPC pulses and coilgun shots shattered ships and threw the Dilgar fleet into chaos. Those ships that remained to the rear of the formation were not able to fire on the station, but they were protected for the moment.

As the _Thoruns_ were deployed, the Terran _Tigers_ waited until the initial barrage had been fired from the station. The Terran fighter design had already proven itself against Jha'dur's _Thoruns_ and they were defending their own home. With twice the number of fighters available, the _Tigers_ began to maneuver in quad fighter flights and took the fight to the Dilgar. Protected by the larger ships as they were ambushed by the station's defense grid, the _Thoruns_ quickly found out that they were outgunned as a wave of graviton missiles from the _Tigers_ shot out toward them. Only those few pilots who were lucky beyond compare survived the first few moments of the massive salvo. Reduced in size, they immediately turned away and moved into the shelter of their larger companion ships.

_Tigers_ followed _Thoruns_, but quickly came afoul of the point defenses on the Dilgar Frigates and Destroyers and many of the _Tigers_ were destroyed when they found themselves faced with capital ships and without any missiles (all of which had been used in their attempt to destroy the _Thorun_ threat). As the Dilgar Frigates and Destroyers exacted a heavy toll on the Terran fighters, _Sekhmets_ of Len'char's fleet began to maneuver and strike at the massive station.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Station Strike Fleet  
Sorith**

Surprised by the Terran attack, Len'char could only watch in horror as the lead ships of his formation were destroyed by Terran weaponry. He was enthused that his _Sekhmets_ had not been heavily damaged thanks to their shields and using them for the first time, he began to rally his ships.

"Are you Dilgar or are you Brakiri? Do I need to ask the Terrans to stop firing so that you can clean yourselves? Get back in formation and open fire with everything that we have!"

Len'char's words galvanized the Dilgar fleet and they began to push through the destroyed ships of the initial assault. Missile ships moved ahead and began to fire off massed salvos to keep the battlestation's main weaponry busy with anti-missile duties. They were disappointed as only a few missiles out of the hundreds fired pierced the point defenses of the station. Further disappointment swept through the Dilgar fleet as the missiles that pierced the point defenses exploded with impotent fury against the hull of the Terran battlestation. Len'char was surprised that the kiloton nukes that his fleet was equipped with did so little damage against the Terran station's armor.

The missile attack and the momentary distraction of the _Thorun/Tiger_ attack allowed the remaining ships to reorient into new pentacan formations. Massed bolter pulses, plasma fire, and missiles continued to fire out at the station, but all too many of them were intercepted. Those few that hit did little damage against the hull of the station.

'_What can pierce that armor_?' was the thought process that was going through each of the Dilgar present as they watched their fire wash impotently across the Terran battlestation.

Len'char continued to exhort his men to keep firing at the station. He knew that even the best defensive grid could be overwhelmed, but inwardly he was greatly surprised at the resilience of the Terran station. His _Sekhmets_ moved into attack position and began using the captured Hyach lasers to good effect against the station taking out turrets and missile bays along the station's axis. He was still bedeviled though by the huge cannon in the center of the station. Each time that cannon fired another of his ships was destroyed. The station was maneuvering, albeit slowly, and bringing that cannon to bear as needed on his fleet.

As his missile ships began to run out of munitions, Len'char saw that the 5th Support Pentacan began to accelerate. Wondering why they were moving so fast, he reached out to them.

"5th Support, why are you moving forward now?"

"For the Glory of the Imperium, Warmaster! We will buy you some breathing room from these Terrans."

"No! You fools, I want that station intact."

Len'char watched in horror as the five ships accelerated beyond their rated capabilities. The Terran station continued to maneuver and Len'char saw that the large domes on the forward surface were now armored and muzzles had appeared there. The station swatted down four of the five missile ships, but the last ship managed to graze the side of the station as it moved past them. His view was changed as his _Mantis_ shook from weapons fire.

"Where did that fire come from? There are no other Terran ships here."

The answer he received was quietly given by a terrified sensor operator.

"Warmaster, a group of ships have just appeared behind us… they just appeared and began firing on us."

Len'char's blood seemed to freeze in his veins. Had the Drakh betrayed him? Only their ships could maneuver like that. What was this?

***-EH-***

_**THS Nemesis  
**_**Sorith**

"Captain, I've got some bad news for you."

"What is it Commander? Are we out of chocolate pudding cups again in the mess hall? I swear procurement does this to us every time we leave the fleet yard."

Commander Anderson looked in horror at his commanding officer and slowly shook his head at his antics.

"No, sir. We've just received Flash Traffic from _Babylon Station 5_. They're under attack from a Dilgar fleet. Estimate is 300 plus ships coming their way. Their fighter group is out and they've got the defense grid online, but they can't hold out long enough."

"Damnation, I was looking forward to seeing 'Uncle Sam' again. How far away are we from Sorith?"

"At our present speed, we'll be there in about half an hour."

"Too slow, too damn slow. What other options do we have?"  
"We can use the more advanced drive system put on board by the tech weenies, it's experimental, but we have the protocols in the main computer system."  
"What does the Kirshiac core have to say about it?"

"Inconclusive Captain, but the tech boys say it will work."  
"Ok, mark it in the ship's log Commander Anderson. Activate the transphase drive system and get us there ASAP."

The transphase drive system was intended to replace the old jump drive system used by Hegemony ships. Instead of using the "usual" layer of hyperspace for travel like the League or even the Centauri, most Hegemony ships tended to use a higher energy layer using their more advanced sensors and better drive systems to maneuver in it (this drive system was known as the phase shift drive system). The transphase drive system accessed an even higher energy layer than normal and was only possible because of the Gravitic Dissipaters on the ship combined with a jump drive taken from the Walkers by the Kirishiac Lords centuries before during their crusade against the ancients. Able to provide an additional layer of protection aside from the hardened armor of the main hull, the Gravitic Dissipaters prevented gravitic distortions could tear apart a less well armored and shielded design when a ship was in this higher energy layer of hyperspace.

The _Nemesis_ made her way along with her escorts into a higher energy layer of hyperspace that few other races could even access. The time needed had dropped from half an hour to less than two minutes in this higher energy layer. As the ship and her escorts reached the Sorith system, Captain Tennant ordered his fleet to slow and for the transphase drive to be taken offline. They would use their phase shift drive to appear in-system near enough to the Dilgar ships.

"Bring all orbitals online and the Interceptor Grid to maximum. Begin routing engine power into the Hypergraviton Cannons as well and prepare to fire a forward barrage. Relay to our escorts to do the same with their Blasters. Phase shift on my command."  
"Yes, sir, the ship is ready for combat and orders have been relayed to our escorts."  
"Very well… Jump!"

The _Nemesis_ and her six _Artemis_ Frigates all made their transition to normal space with little fanfare, but directly "behind" the Dilgar fleet's _Sekhmets_. The arrival of their fleet was eerily similar to what happened to the Centauri at Gorash nearly a century ago. Rather than the experimental _Constitution_ Frigates, the cutting edge _Warlock_ made its transition and immediately opened fire with its Hypergraviton Cannons that erupted in a storm of weapons fire. The PIUC mounts on the _Artemis_ Frigates, along with their Hypergraviton Blasters, and along with their graviton missile mounts on their orbitals added to the general terror of the _Nemesis'_ first strike against the Dilgar.

"Keep hitting them! Keep at 'em!"

Captain Tennat's crew had long served with him and knew some of his more endearing qualities and ignored the more vocal requests that frequently mentioned some kind of stew that he would make out of the Dilgar captured. The gun crews kept up a horrific amount of weapons fire and were surprised that some of the Dilgar ships were able to survive it far better than others. These new ships were not in their warbook and when they came forward to attack them; they fared far better than the other Dilgar ships. The new ships also had better guns, but the Gravitic Dissipaters had been angled for maximum coverage and stopped much of their weapons fire that made it past the Interceptor Grid.

The situation was getting even more precarious as the _Babylon Station_ was steadily taking damage, but the launch of the _Novas_ from the_ Nemesis_ poured gasoline onto the fire. The fast and dangerous fighters shifted the cat-and-mouse game being played by the Terran _Tigers_ and the Dilgar Frigates and Destroyers back to a Terran advantage. The fresh fighters, armed with full warloads, unleashed a large number of graviton missiles that stripped the Dilgar of their lighter ships and allowed the _Tigers_ to disengage from battle.

The _Nemesis_ began to retrieve damaged _Tigers_ as it continued to maneuver against the Dilgar ships while the Gravitic Augmenters did their job well as they functioned as a tractor beam for the more damaged fighters so that they could dock with the _Warlock_. She did this all the while her main guns were taking an increasingly deadlier toll on the Dilgar. Slowly the Dilgar Strike Fleet was being run down by the new arrivals and more Terran ships began to appear in the system.

Using "standard" jump points, two full Squadrons of the Babylon Defense Fleet made their transition into normal space. Seeing the chaos, they chose not to launch their fighters, but did launch missiles at some of the disabled Dilgar ships to put them out of the fight. Too late to prevent the ramming of the _Babylon Station_, they did prevent any other Dilgar ships from coming too close to the station as they superimposed themselves between the Dilgar and the station.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar ship, **_**Mantis  
**_**Sorith**

Len'char looked in horror as his fleet was smashed by Terran reinforcements. He had also lost two thirds of his _Sekhmets_ (three of his five ships) to the Terran's large carrier that appeared in their midst. The secondary ships were preventing his fleet from capturing the Terran battlestation and he was quickly running out of ships. Len'char made a fateful decision at that moment and decided to use the Drakh supplied weaponry on the battlestation. If he couldn't have it, no one else could.

A pair of muzzles appeared on the bow of his _Sekhmet_, appearing as if grown on there. An unearthly purple light began to glow deep inside each muzzle and the weapons discharged a pair of beams of horrific power that slammed two furrows through the forward section of the _Babylon Station_. Len'char remembered that Kas'vaka had warned him that the beam weapons had a minimal generator and would only last for a short while, but would do heavy damage when it was used.

Len'char looked in surprise as the beams exited out the other side and wanted to cheer as atmosphere and debris began to spill out from the former diplomatic section of the Terran battlestation. His cheers died in his throat as the large Terran ship began to systematically execute any ship that it could find. He watched as damaged ships were rendered down to their component atoms by the furious Terran ships and he quickly gave the order to disengage and flee back to Dilgar space.

He struck a blow for the Imperium against the hated Terrans and vowed that he would be back and in even greater numbers. He longed to see the main Terran capital at Proxima burn with the fire of Dilgar weapons. Heedless of the number of his own ships that would be left behind, he ordered his fleet to jump immediately and not to wait for any other ships. They would be left behind for the Terrans to deal with as they would.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 5  
**_**Sorith**

Samuel Ishida looked in horror as several Dilgar ships broke away from the main formation and came on a ramming run on his station. The station moved like a whale and it was only a combination of weapons fire and a judicious use of several Gravitic Augmenters used in concert that prevented heavy damage to his station. He watched as the _Nemesis_ and her escorts came through using their phase shift drive and watched in satisfaction as they opened fire on the Dilgar ships. The Terran ships were more than enough to change the odds and Samuel also happily noticed that the Babylon Defense Fleet's reaction time was better than previously tested. Obviously stress and a bad situation could motivate like nothing else.

"Damage control, report please." Samuel knew that things were bad, but the enhanced armor on his station was resisting enemy fire well enough at the moment. This could easily change given the amount of firepower being directed at his massive station. It was too much of an "easy" target, even with the Interceptor Grid working all the time. He so wished that he could have had the upgraded weaponry that was en-route to his station. The Hypergraviton Blasters would have been very welcome and even more welcome would have been the Gravitic Dissipaters that were set to be installed on his station.

"Governor General, the station has taken heavy damage from that warship hitting our outer hull. It stripped a trench about half a kilometer wide and nearly four long."  
"Good God man, that's nearly the full length of our diplomatic section!"

"Yes sir, it most certainly is and it remains the heaviest damage. We've been keeping the station's opposite sides as much as we can towards the enemy formation, but they're keeping a good portion of their fleet mobile and they keep hitting us near there. Their ships are thin skinned, but much faster than anticipated. The _Nemesis_ is doing an excellent job of keeping them away from that section; in fact her captain has moved his ship closer to that area and is protecting us better than before."

"Good to know that Joe's doing so well out there. Keep me informed if anything changes."

"Yes sir."

Samuel turned back to his main display in the heavily armored command area on the station. It was ironic now that the usually packed forward section of his station was now deserted as everyone had been taken to the shelters in the rear portion of the station. With her weapons now displayed, Samuel knew that the various powers would be frothing at the mouth now that they had a solid proof that the _Babylon Stations_ were this heavily armed. The Hegemony had not said that the stations were armed in any way aside from some defensive guns, but with the Dilgar attack on his station and so many League citizens here, the secret was now out. It might spell bad tidings for the Hegemony or it might make the League's bureaucrats a bit "nicer," if such a thing could happen.

Samuel was pulled away from his thoughts as the deck beneath his feet trembled and then the gravity cut out sharply for a brief moment. Crying out in shock, he wondered what could cause such a disruption in something so fundamental to the operations of his station.

"Governor General, we have a problem here. The diplomatic section has been punctured by some kind of energy weapon that the Kirishiac core is reporting as a Shadow style boser. The weapon streams have shattered the forward hull section and we are venting atmosphere."

That explained the shock of the hit to Samuel immediately. He had spent many hours and days going through what the Kirshiac core on his station contained about their ancient foes, the Shadows. He knew more than maybe some of the HRAD's researchers or Bureau 13's researchers about the Shadows and their weaponry. The boser used against his station was the ultimate in Shadow tech and the simple fact that the Dilgar had them meant the Dilgar was getting help from one of the Shadow thrall races. That complicated matters mightily, especially once the Hegemony's High Council and the Senate was informed. Now, however, was not the time to think such thoughts as he had to save his station.

"Close off the diplomatic section with the damage control doors. Get the main shaft blocked as well in case of weapons fire spillovers. Begin the evacuation of any crewmen in the forward section and get the damage control parties back to the rear of the station as soon as they can get away."

Damage control parties were attempting to deal with some of the hits that had made their way through the Interceptor Grid and the station's armor belt. The final attack by the Dilgar had inflicted heavy damage to the station and many of the crews were rushing around trying to get the internal Gravitic Augmenters to stem the tide of the damage. Pressure walls and other barriers were dropping into place throughout the forward section of the station as the automated systems tried and in some cases failed to prevent any further damage from the Dilgar's parting shot.

"Sir, the _Nemesis_ is moving away from us… My God, Captain Tennant is executing the Dilgar ships that were merely damaged. Sir? Governor General! What are you going to do about this?" The Executive Officer of the station, Tyler Daniels was trying and failing to get a reaction from his commanding officer.

"I'm going to do nothing Mr. Daniels. They brought this on themselves. Continue to work with the damage control parties and get my station back together. We took some nasty hits, but we'll be back in operation soon enough. Take some of the finished products from the factory spaces and get us back operational as soon as you can. I'll deal with the _Nemesis_ and her actions. Dismissed."

Not even acknowledging the salute from his XO, Samuel turned back to his main display and addressed the Defense Grid operations area.

"Coordinate with the Babylon Defense Fleet forces that are in system now and get an exclusion zone setup around the station out to a thousand kilometers. You may continue firing at Dilgar ships that are operational and support the _Nemesis_ as she takes care of those who may be in the exclusion zone."

He had a duty to perform for his own crew, but Samuel knew that his honorary nephew's actions may land him in "hot water" with the brass. That he was under the command of Bureau 13 may save his life if charges came down against him, but that was a concern for another time. Getting his station back together and ending this space battle was all that was Samuel's mind at the moment. Other matters would come as they would…

***-EH-***

_**THS Nemesis  
**_**Sorith**

Captain Tennant's actions were at the forefront of the minds of his crew. They had all looked in shock and then anger as the Dilgar struck a heavy blow against the _Babylon Station_ and they all wanted a measure of revenge against the Dilgar. Moments before "Fighting Joe" could order his crew to follow the Dilgar into hyperspace; he received a message from the station about establishing an exclusion zone. Mindful that orders were orders, he turned away from his intended wrathful position.

"Next time, kitties, next time you won't be so lucky."

Turning back to his bridge crew, his next words were of praise for his crew.

"Don't worry about what we've just done. You did it under my direct command and if anything comes down from the bureaucrats, I'll deal with it. You did very good out there. My thanks go to each of you, you did your duty and we saved a large number of the _Tigers_ out there. Now that the battle is wearing down, use our Gravitic Augmenters to push this wreckage away from the station. Send to our escorts to attend to the station and provide any assistance that they can do. Our part is done for the moment and we have several other ships on their way to us to support us. The Dilgar have done something very foolish here today and I intend to be there when we finish this… our way."

The _Nemesis_ began to clear out space around the _Babylon Station_ and worked in conjunction with the Babylon Defense Fleet's _Hyperions_ to enforce the exclusion zone. It was during this work that the _Marathons_ and the _Cotton_ tender came out of hyperspace into the war zone. Hasty words were spoken and the _Marathons_ took up defensive duties and the _Nemesis_ was released in an attempt to follow the Dilgar in hyperspace. Unfortunately, too much time had progressed and the Dilgar fleet had fled at their maximum speed back to their base.

***-EH-***

The actions of the Dilgar were enough to raise the conflict that they had prosecuted against the League beyond a "mere border action" to something that would bring the Hegemony against them. The League nations were quiet about the action as they saw just how prepared the Terrans were and it frightened them a bit. The _Babylon Stations_ represented peace and hope and now that the "mask" had been drawn back, the League was frightened by what they saw. The Terrans had always been very "proper" with them and now that they had truly revealed what they could do made many in the League wary of continuing in business with them. The truly inspired among the League realized that the _Treaty of Vega_ had been a smokescreen and they all had fallen for it. The Terrans obviously had better ships hidden away and they had just revealed what their stations were capable of doing.

Raw, unedited footage of the Dilgar attack had gone viral and numerous League member nations were in awe of what they witnessed. A single Terran station had stood up to a massive Dilgar fleet. Their own worlds bore the scars and wounds from similar fleets and all too many of the League nations felt a moment of hope. More than a few felt dread as they realized that the Terrans were more powerful than them; they were _more_ powerful than the Centauri. Not wanting to antagonize the Terrans further, many League diplomats were recalled, but a large number chose to remain in Terran space. They felt safer in Terran space than in their own space, especially as the Dilgar were continuing in their attacks.

All looked to the Hegemony to see what their reaction might be. They looked and for a brief moment thought about the minds of the Dilgar and wondered if they might show fear from the possibility of the Terrans taking up arms against them. All however, chose to watch and see.

They would not be disappointed…

**AN:** I end this chapter here. I won't be posting up further chapters until after the New Year while I enjoy the time with my wife and family. The Terran response and any war plans will be in the next chapter that should be up after the New Year near enough to my original posting time of Fridays. That said; enjoy the following section about the _Babylon Stations_:

_**Babylon Station**_

Spacestations have remained a facet of Terran life. Ever since the _Liberty_ class of stations was placed in orbit around Terra, the idea of a station that could support life was highly sought after as humanity moved out into the stars. The debacles of First (and Second) Contact brought to mind the fact that humanity needed better orbital defenses. The first _Babylon Station_ started out in the Sol system and was intended as a place for the Terran Senate to meet, much like Bermuda for when only the Sol system was inhabited by humanity. The station itself became the template for the other _Babylon Stations_ that were built for both defense and for commerce.

The entire station is an awe inspiring sight to a traveler. The full station is 13 kilometers long with multiple sections that make up the station. The width of the station varies from 5 kilometers at the widest point of the forward section of the station is just under 1 kilometer for the docking bay area and back up to 4 kilometers at the engineering section. The forward section of the hull is 5 kilometers long and has a "standard" diameter of 4 kilometers that widens to 5 kilometers (this area of the hull is a full kilometer long and houses the offices for the docking command and held fighter launch bays and was found at the "rear" of the diplomatic section).

The interior of the diplomatic section was set around a 500 meter shaft that went through the entire station and functioned as an elevator shaft (and later was known to be the largest coilgun in known space). The total width of the central shaft is actually 750 meters in diameter since there are ancillary stations and machinery areas around the central shaft. The main shaft actually goes back to the engineering area. The interior space can be modeled after any Inside out world format, indeed _Babylon Station 5_ has an archipelago setup including a large fresh water ocean inside. The most "common" configurations are usually a temperate setup. The full use of gravitics keeps the interior in place and simulates a rotational period similar to Terra.

The diplomatic section also includes a large number of shops and restaurant areas. The front of the diplomatic station has six large domes that are used as observation/hydroponics areas. These domes can become heavily armored and the central part of the dome opens to reveal massive PPC mountings, later swapped out with Hypergraviton Blasters. The domes are mounted around the main shaft and appear much like a PPC mount when the weaponry is deployed. The rear part of the diplomatic section is the widest area at 5 kilometers and features a number of viewing platforms and a few docking bays for smaller merchantmen. The viewing platforms have become a large tourist area as many sentients enjoy watching ships dock at the central area of the station. Fighter launch bays can be found along the wider area of the diplomatic station.

The docking area of the station is 2.5 kilometers in length and features four large arms that extend out 5 kilometers in length (for the largest pair of docking arms) and 2 kilometers (for the smallest pair of docking arms). Through the use of Gravitic Augmenters, a large transport (much like a Q40 transport) can dock with the station and have all of its cargo modules removed in less than half an hour. Up to three of these transports can be docked to each of the larger docking arms, while the smaller docking arms are there for _Clipper_ ships and can accommodate up to six of them there. The arms can be collapsed against the hull when the station needs to maneuver. Indeed it is by the use of gravitics that the station's arms are able to support such large ships when they dock and maneuver around the station and when the arms are brought back against the hull when maneuvering is necessary.

The docking area moves to a series of refineries and specialty foundries that can process trade goods into finished products. This area runs for 1.5 kilometers behind the docking area. _Naquada_ is a common product that is refined in this area and the rear 500 meters of the refining area has six docking arms for _Naquada_ refueling stations. A number of finished products can also be found in this area of the station and the rear docking arms are considerably shorter at only 1 kilometer in length.

Leading from the refining area is the main propulsion/engineering bay for the station. It measures 4 kilometers in length and is a combination of several cylinders. The main cylinder is 2 kilometers in width and there are four secondary cylinders that are 1 kilometer each in diameter around the main cylinder. Additional hydroponic bays and minor manufacturing areas are part of the propulsion/engineering bay. The four large gravitic enhanced plasma engines are the largest engines in known space (something that even the Kirishiacs have commented upon) and are combined with the specialty gravitic drive system used by the Hegemony to move the ponderous station. The main power for the station comes from four pyramidal power systems of a single Gravitic Singularity and four Energy Captor Systems that then feed their antimatter into a massive Gravitic Singularity at the center of the station (having in total 16 Energy Captor Systems that feed into 5 Gravitic Singularities). The massive power requirements of the station and the main armament can use almost as much power as what is used for most Inside out worlds in their power generation needs.

After the Battle of _Babylon Station 5_, the Hegemony began to upgrade the main weaponry of each _Babylon Station_. The older Heavy PPC turrets have given way to Hypergraviton Cannons and Blasters. The Heavy Coilguns remain in use as their ability to fire off antimatter makes them a terrifying and very effective weapon system. Secondary turrets of the Interceptor Grid give the station good protection from fighters and projectiles. Large capacity missile bays ring the station in several areas around the diplomatic section, the docking area, and the rear propulsion/engineering section of the station. Even with the massive sections of hardened armor, the addition of Gravitic Dissipaters has made the _Babylon Stations_ nearly impregnable from all but the largest fleets.

Technical Specifications:  
Class: Babylon Station  
Type: Spacestation  
Length: 13,000 meters  
Mass: 152,000,000,000 tons  
Acceleration: 1.5 G  
Crew: 11,000  
Troops: 8,200  
Small Craft: 128 Fighters and up to 50 Shuttles

Power/Propulsion:

1 Type V Gravitic Singularity  
4 Type IV Gravitic Singularities  
16 Type 4 Energy Captor Systems  
4 Blue Moon Gravitic-enhanced Plasma Engines  
1 Gravitic Drive  
2 Atlas-K Dual Charge Jump Engines  
1 Bolo Phase Shift Drive System

Weapons:

1 50,000 mm Heavy Coilgun (500 meter central shaft)  
6 Burner-9 Heavy Antigraviton Cannons (forward mount)  
36 Edison/GE Heavy PPC mounts, turreted (six barrel design)  
64 Edison/GE Mk II Interceptors, turreted (six barrel design)  
48 Boeing Graviton Missile Pods, turreted (576 total missiles, 12 per pod)

Defensive Systems:

Hardened Armor Hull, 100 meters thickness _Adamantine/Mithral_ Composite throughout  
12 Gravitic Augmenters  
Mk II Interceptor System

Post upgrade:  
Mass: 173,000,000,000 tons

Weapons:

6 Burner-K3 Hypergraviton Blasters (forward mount)  
12 Burner-K2 Hypergraviton Blasters, Heavy Orbital  
36 Edison/GE Heavy PIUC mounts, Orbital  
64 Edison/GE Mk III Interceptors, Light Orbital

Defensive Systems:

16 Gravitic Augmenters/Dissipaters  
Mk III Interceptor System


	14. Don't Come Crying to Me

**A/N: **With family in town the previous week, not much was done aside from eating lots of good things and reading plenty of Dan Abnett's _Eisenhorn _and _Ravenor_ Omnibuses. Oh the good story telling in both of those series, I highly recommend them to anyone. Now on to the story...**  
**

**Chapter 13 Don't Come Crying to Me…**

Emotions throughout known space seemed to spike when word of the Dilgar's blatant attack on _Babylon Station 5_ filtered out through the Terran Information Network. Condolences came first from the Centauri as the Centaurum denounced the Dilgar attack as "brutal and unnecessary." Other nations in the League were of two different opinions: either they were horrified by the actions and felt pity for the Hegemony's loss or they felt that the Hegemony "deserved" this as a righteous judgment against them. Those who fell into the camp of the Hegemony "deserving" judgment for their previous stance of nonintervention (notwithstanding the actions of the _Persephone_ at Tirrith) felt that this would finally be the nudge needed to bring the Hegemony into the war against the Dilgar on the far side of the League.

The Hegemony felt a large degree of wrath towards the Dilgar and the actions of Joe Tennant and his ship, the _Nemesis_, at Sorith was met with a large degree of agreement. The number of people who showed up to join up with the HAF and with Bureau 13's armed forces swelled once the actions was fully released to the public. Properly scrubbed video footage was released that showed the Dilgar attack and this was used to incite public opinion against the Dilgar. All throughout the Hegemony, citizens began campaigns to petition their Senators to support a measure against the Dilgar.

A cold rage began to take hold in the hearts of many in the Hegemony as they thought about what would be needed to bring the war to the Dilgar and to exact a measure of vengeance against them. Plans that were previously shelved were brought out once more following the attack on _Babylon Station 5_, plans that were previously shelved as being wasteful or too complicated. These plans were nothing less than the total takeover of the League or for the worst case scenarios, the total destruction of the League. The cold rage called for either option and few would deny the Hegemony their due.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 5  
**_**Sorith**

Governor General Samuel Ishida took a moment to collect his thoughts before he let loose on the bevy of League diplomats who were surging around him.

"What do you mean you pack of mongrel curs? What thoughts fill those empty minds of yours? Do you really think that your place has become more than what it originally was?"

His tirade was cut short when his honorary "nephew" Joe Tennant came toward him scattering the League diplomats.

"Damn, Uncle Sam. You did a number on that Vree ambassador. It looked like he wanted to teleport away from you. I don't think I ever expected to get that particular hand gesture from an Abbai Matriarch before either… They either must be desperate or crazy to think that we would help them further."

"Joe, they **are** desperate **and** crazy. They think we're going to help them since we had to deal with the Dilgar's attack here. We're cleaning up for the time being, but I get the feeling that Sorith will be a major staging area since we're so close to the Drazi front and to the Dilgar's own home system of Omelos."

"I did hear a rumor that the Bureau had sent out an expedition to Omelos to check out the system, but I haven't heard much, especially since I came out this way to come see you. How's the update going?"

"Good enough, so much so, that I wish that we had the new weaponry when the Dilgar came calling. If we had that kind of guns, we wouldn't have needed the Babylon Defense Squadrons…"

Samuel thought back to the quick response of his Defense Squadrons, they had made excellent time, but if the new _Marathons_ had been in system instead, the battle would certainly have gone much more differently. The new weapons suite was far better than previously found on the _Babylon Stations_, but it almost seemed to be too little too late for Samuel's tastes. He knew that the war had come to them and soon enough the war would go to the Dilgar as well.

"Joe, you know that things will not be the same, right? We aren't the same, much like how we changed after we met the Centauri across gunsights."

"That's a bit morbid Uncle Sam, but God willing, the Dilgar will certainly rue the day. Don't you remember some of the ceremonies that the Centauri Diplomats used to watch on Novo Terra? Scared them almost to death when we did the full Maori ceremonies, especially the ones that involved blood. I think the League is dealing with the same situation, but viewed more through how we originally treated them. Just think of the backlash that's going to come out as the various League nations realize that the _Babylon Stations_ are fully armed and operational battlestations."

"Joe, that joke is in poor taste. I know the problems that we're dealing with here seem trivial, but there's going to be hell to pay for the Senate and the Council of Lords."

Thinking of the issues ahead gave Samuel a massive headache and he was happy that he wasn't making policy.

***-EH-***

**Jha'dur's quarters  
Omelos  
Dilgar Imperium**

"'War is merely the continuation of politics by other means' or something along those lines. I remember reading this quote from a Terran military leader who is required reading in all of their military academies. I had made several copies of his book _On War_ that I planned on distributing to all of my sub-commanders, but Len'char put a stop to that in his capacity as the Head of Intelligence. What rubbish that we can't learn from a possible foe… a foe that has been made one before we could be ready for them. Len'char really is a fool!"

Jha'dur stopped for a moment as she whirled to face Ari'shan who at that moment had his nose in a book of Terran literature. Jha'dur had a quick glimpse and saw a title that was done in a script of some kind, but also had a translation next to it. Something about war being an art or something else like that. She had plenty of Terran books and multiple translations of other books on warfare, but it was the response from Ari'shan that caught her by surprise.

"Why did Len'char make these books illegal? This author brings up plenty of good points about warfare and if I hadn't known it better, I would have said that it was a Dilgar author instead of a Terran one."

"Len'char was 'afraid' that sharing Terran ideas about warfare would contaminate our military and make us lessened in some way."

"I still don't see how we would be lessened. I am tempted to bring copies to my father to let him read of these ideas, but I also know that he has little time of late."

"No thanks to Len'char's idiotic strike against the Terrans!"

The vehemence in our voice was a sentiment held by many within the Warmaster's Council. Len'char had done much against the Terrans, but he was also being vilified since the Dilgar were not at war with the Terrans. While his strike against the Terran battlestation had been inspired, it also brought in the Terrans as another faction in their war against the League. While the Dilgar forces were doing well, surprisingly so in some cases, opening up another front in the war was just poor strategic thinking. Trying to get Len'char to realize that fact was proving to be difficult.

"Have you noticed some strange things of late with the logistics network Ari?"

"Somewhat, my unit still hasn't received their latest _Thorun_ upgrades, but some of the other ships have already received theirs and Logistics hasn't given us any good answers. Warship upgrades have come through lately, but nothing else and I have noticed some different technicians of late as well."

"I too have noticed that also, especially some of the latest upgrades seem to be of League quality or at least design. The lasers on my command ship have been upgraded again."

The two comrades-in-arms took some time together to wonder about where the upgrades could have come from and spent that time enjoying what little time that they could get. Both knew that soon enough they would be plunged back into the war. The scope of which had changed drastically with a secondary front that had opened in such a horrific method. Both present took a few moments more and then separated to go their own way.

***-EH-***

**Centaurum Chambers  
Centauri Prime**

"House Mollari moves to allow the Royal Navy to intervene in the current Dilgar crisis on the side of the Terran Hegemony."

"House Jaddo seconds this motion."

The debate went long and loud for many of the members of the Centaurum. House Mollari, backed by House Jaddo, had put forward a motion for the Royal Navy to intervene in the Dilgar War. Emperor Turhan seemed pleased at the motion and supported it as well. The Emperor looked around the chamber at the ornamentation and at the various members of the Centaurum. Regardless of their like or dislike of the former vassal states in the League, the Centauri had much to gain by their entry into the war. They could lose some ships, though the new _Morado_ was slowly replacing the older _Primus_ as their principal combat ship and the losses would allow for the newer ship to fully take the previous place of the _Primus_ in their fleets.

Emperor Turhan brought his attention back to the debate and saw that only the Isolationists were still fighting the motion and were trying to stall to get more to vote with them. The bloc headed up with Houses Mollari and Jaddo had too many votes on their side and the work of the Isolationists was too little too late for them. He was certain that the vote would come out to what he knew would be good for the Empire.

They had gained a good deal of strength following their conflict with the Terrans and aside from the various smaller House Navies, the Royal Navy was fully upgraded with better ships than before. Those embarrassing moments during the conflict with the Terrans had been dealt with due to better training and more than a few war games with the HAF Navy. All things taken together, the Centauri were well prepared to intervene on the side of the Hegemony.

Looking out further over the proceedings, Emperor Turhan looked to his wife, the Lady Morella and saw that she was staring off with her eyes unfocused. Concerned for his third wife due more to her special abilities, Emperor Turhan left the Centaurum chambers sure of the imminent victory of the motion put forth by House Mollari. As he watched his wife closely, her gaze returned to normal and she slowly smiled at her husband.

"What did you see Morella?"

"Death and more death and our people watching through another's eyes… we have so little that can be done and our fate remains beyond our own hands."

Mulling those words over in his mind, Emperor Turhan thought that perhaps things were not as good as he figured on them being.

***-EH-***

**HAF Naval Headquarters  
New Earth**

Officers moved across the surface of the first Terran extra-solar colony with a sense of renewed purpose. Each of the officers and their contingents were on their way to the main bunker complex where war planning took place. The Terran response to the Dilgar attack on _Babylon Station 5_ was anticipated by all the various nations in the galaxy, but few knew exactly how they would do so.

Fleet Lord Donald Marik was the current head of HAF Navy Intelligence and was reeling due to the intelligence failure to identify the Dilgar attack. He took full responsibility, more due to his position and its status than any real need to shelter the analyst who didn't spot the buildup, for the Dilgar attack and it stung his sensibilities. That his own department had failed to prevent the loss of Terran lives made the attack even worse for him and his department. They had to atone for their failure to prevent the loss of Terran lives and the damage to one of their massive _Babylon Stations_. The pride of the Terran people was also at stake.

As Fleet Lord Marik made his way to the main Council Chamber on New Earth, he passed numerous groups of young officers from the War Plans Division and all of them had the same determined look common to young officers (full of piss and vinegar) with a plan in mind. His own mind was churning through multiple ideas that had already gone through following the attack and more came to mind as he continued to walk to the main chamber. So lost in thought, he barely noticed the salute of the fully armored Army guards as he showed his main identification.

Entering the brightly lit room, he could see that the Council of Lords was almost full. Each of the autonomous Ring Worlds had their representatives, either a Fleet Lord or a War Lord (Naval and Ground Forces Commanders respectively), and the commanders of each of the Fleets and RCTs were present as well. The presence of both the HRAD and Bureau 13 Lords bespoke of how important this meeting was for the future of the Hegemony. None of the Kirishiac Lords were present, but Fleet Lord Marik had not heard from them in quite some time as it was.

"Assembled Lords, please be seated. We have much to discuss today. Our future stands before us and the decision we much take today. We must plan for our war to come and our plans must have the necessary contingencies in place." Fleet Lord Marik looked out over the assembled Lords and saw the same looks of determination on their faces that was mirrored on his own.

"I do have some good news for you in that the Centaurum has passed a measure that will send their Royal Navy to support our own attack on the Dilgar. I do believe that we can include the Royal Navy into any plans that we have for the Dilgar. I do believe that the plan codenamed _Chimera_ is perhaps the best plan that we can execute, especially as we will have the assistance of the Centauri."

The Fleet Lord's words caused many within the Council Chamber to balk at them. They were strong enough not to worry about having another race join up with them. The simple thought of it was appalling and many sought to censure the Head of Intelligence Operations. Fleet Lord Marik finally was able to call for quiet as he brought up the particulars for the planned offensive.

"Lords, here is the plan before us. It is called _Chimera_ due to the idea of using multiple attack fleets. We will hit the Dilgar all along their current front. Each of their warlords will be attacked directly and their fleets broken. With the aid of the Centauri's Royal Navy we can execute the most ambitious part of this attack; Omelos herself will be attacked as well. While our Task Forces advance against the Dilgar at three of their main attack positions, we will wait until the Royal Navy Task Force is near enough to Omelos and then we all strike at once. If at all possible, we will cut the head off of the Dilgar military and then the League can do their own cleanup of their worlds. We can deploy several of our RCTs and bombardment fleets with the Task Forces if we decide to take care of any Dilgar formations that remain on the League worlds."

Pausing for a moment to take a drink of water, the Fleet Lord looked to see that his fellow Lords were slowly nodding their heads as the particulars of the operation were shown to them. The next part of his presentation was likely to bring up some more dissension.

"The final part that I bring up to all of you is that we can vote on going forward with Operation _Chimera_ or we can launch an all-out strike on Omelos instead." Hearing the cheering going on at this notion, the Fleet Lord raised his hands for silence. "I know that this proposal has merit as well, but we're going to face a defense grid not unlike the Terran main grid. The Dilgar are getting help from another First One and Governor General Samuel Ishida was able to be here through a video link to talk about the weapon used against his _Babylon Station_."

The war plans moved to the side as another three dimensional picture took shaped and quickly resolved into the appearance of the Governor General of _Babylon Station 5_. He nodded a greeting to the Lord present who determined war plans and those who actually commanded the various HAF formations.

"My greetings to all of you. In another time and place I would be tempted to use humor, but after looking at the BattleROMs of the battle again prior to this meeting, I discovered a possible link with who might have supplied the Dilgar with equipment. The weapon used against my command matches fairly closely to a Shadow Battle Crab's Boser. The beam discharge is identical, but the power output was on the low side. That leads me to consider that the Dilgar do not have the proper power generation capabilities or that the weapon may have been operated off a battery reserve. It was very effective given that it strips away armor by using antibosuns that created a matter/antimatter reaction. The weapon also has a good penetrative effect due to the high kinetic energy. From what my technical staff were able to determine is that the Dilgar's new weapon system is easily analogous to a Hypergraviton Cannon in peak output, but remains a bit nastier in overall damage done due to the weakening of atomic bonds on any ship struck by the beams."

Muttering could be heard of how the "standard" ships of the line would be very susceptible to this kind of weapon. The unmodified early model _Hyperions_ would be especially susceptible, especially those in the "open" fleet groups that showed the Hegemony's supposed adherence to the Treaty of Vega. Some of the HRAD leaders appeared to be drawn into a conference with the titular head of Bureau 13.

Governor General Ishida continued on, "I can say with a good bit of credulity that new weapon and armor upgrades, especially the Gravitic Dissipaters, can handle any Dilgar fleet. Even their main line Strike Fleets with heavy warship support will have trouble enough with any _Babylon Station_ they come up against and that is without including the _Marathons_ stationed by each one."

One of the assembled Fleet Lords, Fleet Lord Brian Grayson of the 3rd Battle Fleet, took that as a cue that his part of the briefing was up next.

"Lords, as an aside to what the Governor General has just told us, we have a resource that can be tapped to increase the potential combat capabilities of our various Fleet groups. As many of you are aware that we have our Fleets built around supporting a large contingent of fighters, a complete Group at that, what I propose is to disband the old Babylon Defense Fleets and place their Squadrons with each of the current Fleets. This way our current fleets can benefit from the Cruiser-heavy squadrons of the Babylon Defense Fleets and our own Fighter Groups can be beefed up with an additional Wing of fighters. To sweeten the deal, perhaps we can see about upgrading the mixed _Hyperion's_ and _Olympus's_ at the same time and then start a rolling refit of each individual Squadron."

The words were taken well and the idea was accepted by the various Fleet Lords. It was obvious, though, that the War Lords were starting to grow bored by the talk of upgrading the various Fleets. Aside from some Marine CAAN combat groups, the RCTs had little chance of gaining experience or glory on the battlefield. Even though the RCTs had some experience, the vast majority of it was on the training field. Not wanting to be left out of the chance for glory, the War Lords began discussing amongst themselves as the talk wore on over the status of Fleet refits.

"Assembled Lords, perhaps the _Nova's_ of the HAF Army can be of some good as well." War Lord Jonathan Davion rose smoothly from his seat with his opening remarks. "The RCTs are well supplied with equipment and we also have our own transport ships that were not included as part of the Treaty of Vega. Even the older model _Tyche's_ used by the CAAN teams are able to respond quickly enough to deal with enough of the Dilgar. I'd like to add my support to the original part of the proposal to use the RCTs and the Bombardment Fleets as an additional element for the Task Forces to be formed. We have eight RCTs and aside from the two RCTs that are training with the Centauri, the other six are ready for combat operations. If we split them evenly between the three proposed Task Forces, which should give each fleet the ability to send a large number of our ground troops into battle to keep the Dilgar off balance."

"That is indeed a good evaluation there War Lord Davion and I believe that the other thoughts are a good balance to allow all of our forces to gain a measure of glory. I presume that is your actual intention?"

"It is indeed Fleet Lord Marik. We have so few chances at gaining experience aside from exercises and I know that some of the Dilgar-held worlds will be difficult to take and then to hold in light of any counter attacks."

"If Operation _Chimera_ works out well enough, then we most likely will only have scattered pockets of Dilgar to deal with and even then the League can handle them."

"With all due respect Fleet Lord, have you seen what the League considers to be 'normal' for their ground forces?"

"No, not at all."

"Nothing, that's what the League have available to them for the most part. They tend to spend their money on keeping the enemy away from their worlds with their fleets. An admirable thought, but we have centuries of warfare behind us that have shown that we still need a ground force to truly take a system. The Dilgar will be tough enough to fight in space, just imagine how more difficult they'll be once they find out that their homeworld was captured and all of their commanders are dead. It will either be a nightmare taking them out on the ground or they could capitulate easily enough. We don't know which option they'll take, but we'll need to be ready for both."

Looking out at the assembled Lords, War Lord Davion saw that many had contemplative looks on their faces and many seemed to agree with his sentiment. The hours went by quickly as the assembled officers debated each part of proposed war plan. A good bit of their plan hinged on the Centauri joining them and many within the HAF was not happy about that part of the plan. The proposed upgrading of numerous combat elements from the warships of the HAF Navy to the development of personnel scaled ion weaponry was discussed and approved by all those present. In the eyes of many of the Fleet Lords, the War Lords would have little to do if they truly had their say on the matter, but they all knew that unless they were prepared for the worst it would surely find them.

***-EH-***

_**Wandering Saint  
Covran**_** – class Scout  
Usuuth system  
November 2230**

The small Centauri scout was doing a scan of the Republic's spinward regions. The area was of little consequence, especially once the Republic had contracted away from the warlike Orieni. With the minimal borders between the two previously belligerent empires of little consequence, the various patrols that went out expected to find little. While the Royal Navy was slowly staging for the planned invasion of the Dilgar Imperium, scouts continued to go along the Republic's borders. Unlike those few scout ships sent to the shared border with the Minbari or the handful of small empires, those ships sent the Republic's borders expected little of consequence to happen to them. It is highly ironic that such a mindset would lead to such fear that would grip the Centauri people all due to what the small scout ship in a far out of the way place.

"Lieutenant we are picking up a trace of transmissions that appear to be of Orieni origin."

"That can't be true, run the scan again. Your equipment might be faulty, do a self-test first and then do the scan."

Sighing with resignation, the technician checked his equipment again and grimaced at the ten minute cycle he would have to endure. He endured to simply because he wanted to go back to his cabin and enjoy the Merlot from New California, a place he had never been to, but envisioned the vacation time coming up so that he could visit the Inside out world with his wife.

"The self-test is complete and the scan is the same as before Lieutenant. I'm picking up a large cluster of ships in the Usuuth system near the outskirts of the system. Large numbers of ships and they're moving like an exercise."

"Go silent on your scans and get as much as possible with the passive sensors."

The Lieutenant had accepted the duty as a particularly onerous one, especially since he had it because of a liaison with a House Lord's daughter, but he had never hoped to see what his technician had found. It terrified him a bit more than hearing about some of the battles fought against the Terrans. The Orieni had always been the "Bogeyman" that his grandfather still talked about in a quiet voice. It was almost as if he was afraid that one of them would jump out of the shadows as talked to his grandchildren.

"Scans are complete Lieutenant."

"Bring up the jump drive and get us out of here."

"Aye sir."

Irony is something that happens in the universe enough; in this case it was the height of irony that the jump drive on the _Wandering Saint_ was a retrofitted Terran design that made use of _naquada_ to power it. The _Covran_ Scout fled as quickly as it could back to Centauri space. Each time it approached a naval base, it was sent on to the next in a case of brinkmanship that would rival the best that Machiavelli had written about centuries ago. Each way station's commander didn't want to be the one to report to the Centaurum the politically damaging information and each in turn sent the _Wandering Saint_ on and on until it arrived at Centauri Prime.

Space around Centauri Prime was slowly filling up as more and more of the Royal Navy was massing for the big push alongside the Terrans against the Dilgar. It was into this tableau that the _Wandering Saint_ exited from a jump point. Calling out for the Admiral in charge of the planetary defenses, the young Lieutenant on the _Covran_ was almost desperate to report in to a superior officer. The thoughts of the large Orieni fleet poised so close to the Republic's border was wearing away at his psyche and almost had him in a panic. Finally getting through, he dumped the entirety of his sensor logs and ran to his cabin and wouldn't come out.

Intrigued by the odd behavior of the young Lieutenant, the Admiral (Cairns Jaddo) looked at the download and experienced a brief moment of stark terror. Too young to have been in the Royal Navy, but with enough stories told about the Orieni, he immediately saw the potential repercussions of such a large Orieni fleet near to the spinward border of the Republic. It could only be a precursor to an invasion and with the Royal Navy about to be on the complete other side of the Republic, the Orieni would be continue unmolested by but a few House fleets. With that particular terror in mind, Admiral Cairns Jaddo called for a full meeting of the Centaurum.

His request went through quickly enough and enough members had remained behind at Centauri Prime (more than a few simply to watch the buildup of the Royal Navy) in order for the Centaurum to have a voting quorum. He truly didn't want to be the one to squash the plans of his own House or their titular allies the Mollari's, but this situation was his alone to bear. He slowly made his way to the reconvened Centaurum and waited for the conversations to cease.

"My Lords and Ladies it is with a heavy heart that I must report news of the gravest sort. We are all watching the Royal Navy assemble and I join with you in feeling the greatness of what is assembled. My news will change your mind on the deployment of the Royal Navy."

With those words, all present lost some sense of decorum as they all tried to shout over each other. Those who supported sending the Royal Navy against the Dilgar Imperium were engaged in shouting matches with those who were against using the Royal Navy in such a way. All talk, loud or otherwise, tapered off as the recording played out to the chamber. Some of the older members of the Centaurum remembered those same ships coming for them in the dark days of their war with the Orieni. Silence filled the Centaurum and was only stopped when the head of House Mollari reluctantly came to his feet.

"In light of this evidence, House Mollari withdraws the request for the Royal Navy to support the Terran Hegemony against the Dilgar Imperium. Our forces are needed elsewhere and it would be negligent of us to not protect our own citizens. I know this runs counter to what was previously voted upon by our august body, but it bodes poorly if we do not defend our own."

Talk became quicker as more and more of the Noble House Lords and Ladies agreed with House Mollari's sentiments. Finally the Emperor called for silence and was greeted with it.

"I agree with this present course of action. The Royal Navy will be sent to our spinward reaches and a diplomatic mission will be sent to the Orieni to see why they would knowingly violate the Treaty of Seliffe. We will gain answers that we need to get and soon enough. I am saddened that we cannot aid our allies in the Hegemony, but they have the military might to prevail over the Dilgar."

With a stroke of fate, the proposed counter attack against the Dilgar was decreased in size to only what the Hegemony could bring against the Dilgar.

***-EH-***

**Warmaster's Convocation  
Omelos**

The assembled Warmasters met without aides present to hash out a response to the aborted attack by Len'char against one of the Terran's _Babylon Stations_. Had his attack been successful many of those present expected that they would be congratulating him on his audacity, but the actual events were far less than expected. All present were waiting for the Terran response and many figured on it being spectacular in the extreme. The violence shown by the Terran news reporting and the general opinion that too little was done against those few surviving Dilgar ships was chilling to all those present or present via video conferencing.

Conversation was muted and varied as the assembled Warmasters began to discuss a myriad of topics ranging from Len'char's failed attack to the warships that he used in the attack. The Warmasters were intrigued by the idea of using captured technology and few thought that such an effective ship could be built. It wasn't until they saw the price tag that they balked at the extreme expense involved with the project. Some of the more technologically inclined Warmasters wondered if they could use some of the upgrades on their own ships. Their _Mishakur_ Dreadnought was discussed several times as a possible candidate for upgrading using at the very least Abbai style shields to improve protection. Other ships were too lightly armored to upgrade other than some weapon systems to improve their fire projection capabilities.

The one topic that was brought up was if Len'char was to face charges. He was still missing following the attack on the _Babylon Station_, but the majority of the Warmasters assumed (correctly at that) that he was at the hidden shipyard for his ships. Gar'shan stood up and called the meeting to order finally and the Warmasters continued to hash out their current plans to finish off the League. Gar'shan expressly told his Warmasters that they should not antagonize the Terrans in any way. This stance angered some of the Warmasters, but Gar'shan faced down each of them with a stern glare. Orders were cut to take into account if the Terrans did attack them, but their hope was on a diplomatic solution.

Too many of the Warmasters were afraid of the Terran military and the large fleet that was necessary to even take on one of their spacestations. Even though Len'char's fleet did not feature any of the _Mishakur_ in their assault, Jha'dur's fleet featured several full pentacans of them and they were beaten by a single Terran cruiser and a pair of destroyers. With that kind of possible ratio for combat, they knew that their Strike Fleets just did not have the number to defend against a concentrated Terran assault on them.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Staging Area  
Location unknown**

Len'char's _Mantis_ came out of the jump point with a flare of light and was followed by a small number of ships that escaped from his botched attack on the Terran _Babylon Station_ at Sorith. Only two of his hideously expensive _Sekhmets_ survived out of the five that went to Sorith and that survival seemed almost a stroke of luck than any real skill on their part. Even fewer of the jump capable ships made it out and almost none of his non-jump capable ships managed to escape the vengeful Terran fleet.

Shaking with equal parts of fear and rage Len'char pushed himself out of his seat and made his way to the main entryway of his ship. His ship was partially damaged and right now all he wanted to do was to escape away, but he stayed out of some kind of stubbornness. He did have a responsibility, though it was a bit late given how few of his fleet had made it back to their shipyards. He did hope that his original plan to scatter the ships back to their intended units would still work.

Even seeing his Drakh contact, Kas'vaka, gave him little comfort after the rout of his forces.

"You could have told me just how little those special systems had in the way of available power. If I had known about their penetration capability I would have had all of the _Sekhmets_ in my fleet fire them first instead of as a last resort."

"You never asked Len'char. It is not the fault of the Drakh if the Dilgar never asked about what their ships were carrying…"

Kas'vaka's words caught Len'char short. Did he really forget to ask about the capabilities of the specialty weaponry added to his ships? Even if that was the truth, he was still indignant that the Drakh had not told him given their relationship. What he heard next from Kas'vaka filled him with some dread, even more so than what he was currently feeling.

"Others in your species have noted our presence among several of the shipyards. To allay suspicion, we have had to develop other ships for your race. One of the Warmasters," at this point Len'char's insides turned to ice, "I believe her name is Jha'dur. She wanted a specialty ship designed for her. We could not deny her this otherwise she would raise a stink. We could not silence her like so many others who found us out."

"What kind of ship did you create for her?"

Len'char's mind swam for a moment as he contemplated what kind of ship that Jha'dur would have the Drakh create for her.

"She calls them the _Dagger_ class of ships. It is comparable to your _Sekhmet_ and is better armed than the _Mishakur_ Dreadnoughts that your people use as their main combat ship. Her ship is called the _Stiletto_ and the basic design looks fairly similar to a Terran _Olympus_ Destroyer."

Len'char remembered the specification of the _Olympus_ and the wedge-shaped ship had proven to be incredibly deadly at Tirrith, much to the chagrin of Jha'dur's 1st Strike Fleet. Len'char did have some questions for Kas'vaka concerning Jha'dur's new ship:

"Did you use the same building technique for the _Sekhmets_?"

"Yes, we were able to bond League technology, most of which came from the Abbai for Jha'dur's new ship line."

"Which systems? Are they a match for the _Sekhmets_ and the specialty systems that were added for our attack?"

"No need to worry Len'char, Jha'dur won't be able to challenge your power with these ships. They do not have the weaponry from our Masters on them; unlike your own ships, that is."

Len'char remembered the shadowy masters that Kas'vaka had talked to him about a few times. They must truly be powerful if they were spoken of so fondly by the Drakh.

"Good. I take it that these ships are ready for Jha'dur's fleet."

"They are, though she has given part of the seven we built for her to her brother's Strike Fleet as well. They are unique ships, not unlike what the Terrans are capable of building. It will be unique to see what they can do against the Terrans when they come for you."

"Wait, you know what the Terrans are planning?"

"While we have not been able to infiltrate them, we have infiltrated the Centauri and the Centauri plan on aiding the Terrans by moving their Royal Navy to support Terran operations."

"Is that true Kas'vaka? Are the Centauri really going to throw their lot in with the Terrans?"

Len'char felt the chill come back to his spine. If the Centauri joined up with the Terrans, then their entire endeavor was lost. This was something that needed to be brought to the attention of the Warmaster's Convocation. He dimly remembered that he was currently missing from the Convocation and would need to report in anyway. This bit of intelligence would be enough to save his position and possibly shield him from the potential backlash of his failed attack on the Terran _Babylon Station_. He almost didn't hear the Drakh's answer to his question as he was brought back to reality.

"Repeat that again for me Kas'vaka, what did you say?"

"Len'char, I told you the truth. House Mollari with backing from House Jaddo put forth the particular motion and the Centaurum approved the motion. As we speak, the Royal Navy is gathering at Centauri Prime, or at least that was the last message I received from one of our scouts."

"That could be a disaster for us."

Inwardly, Kas'vaka smiled. He didn't care for the Dilgar at all and much like the Orieni, they were an end to a means. Chaos would reign in this galaxy. The Dilgar would be the proverbial 'cat's paw' for the galaxy and he would like nothing more than to see it burn. Seeing the Centauri brought low would avenge the desecration and destruction of his race's homeworld. The Orieni had turned against them in the end. How ironic to see Vorlon thralls led by one touched by Chaos incarnate!

"No disaster Len'char if you prepare the Warmasters for this eventuality. Did you not acquire a number of the defensive measures employed by the Abbai? Prepare your world's defenses thusly and you should remain strong."

"Yes, yes that is what we need to do. Bring all of our ships up to a similar technology level as the League and use what we have taken from them against our common foe. I will do this for my people. Nothing else remains to be done."

Len'char began plotting just how he would use this new information to cement his position in spite of his losses. He would be the ascendant Warmaster for the Dilgar race. He would lead them to victory over the League and the Centauri! If the Terrans wanted to join in, then they would burn just as well as any other! So caught up in a sense of righteous fervor, Len'char did not see Kas'vaka leave the room nor did he see Kas'vaka speak to another Drakh. Both disappeared from the station and would not be seen again by Len'char.

***-EH-***

**HAF Naval Headquarters  
New Earth**

Orbit around New Earth remained an ever shifting morass of ships and inter-orbit tugs and other small craft. Traffic directors liked to take cocky new recruits and let them try to direct traffic for just fifteen minutes; those who survived the conditions were congratulated on surviving the experience, not unlike the ceremonies of ancient Terra when a ship passed the equator. Those recruits who were not burned out by the experience, once they go on to their new posts, speak quietly of just how chaotic the three dimensional space is around New Earth. Even the _Babylon Stations_ with their constant influx of new shipping and departure of said shipping does not compare to the Naval Headquarters of the HAF Fleet.

It was into this "organized" chaos that a Centauri diplomatic transport came out of hyperspace with a bright blue funnel and a dedicated escort from a Terran _Hyperion_. Using the same _Clipper_ design common across League and Hegemony space, the sleek ship was setup as a personnel transport rather than as a bulk transport. The interior was nicely appointed for the Centauri diplomat, but he had little time for the interior. The news he brought would not be taken well at all by the Hegemony, or so he thought, but he truly did not know how the Terrans would react to it.

His ship received an approach vector towards a geosynchronous station that he had not been to before. It was unique indeed since this system had long been off limits to anyone not from the Hegemony. His presence here was as much due to his intended message as it was to his status. The Terrans needed to hear what he had for them, but a nice glass of Terran scotch should calm his nerves somewhat. Londo Mollari wondered if it was the fact that his House had put forward the motion in the Centaurum as the possible reason why he had been sent to the Hegemony. He could think of no other reason… at least none came to mind.

His ship finally docked and he slowly made his made through to the docking collar. A small retinue of Terran fleet officers was present along with what appeared to be an honor guard. So far, so good, at least to Londo's mind. The scotch had warmed its way into his belly and he was feeling pretty good about the meeting. He was led towards an office that was even nicer than his ship and he was gratified to see that the officer had an even larger collection of Terran alcoholic drinks available. Helping himself to a large glass, Londo slowly made his way to a large comfortable armchair next to the official's desk.

"Mmm, I do enjoy the alcohol you Terrans have available. One of the nicer parts of my duty, yes?"

"Indeed Mr. Mollari."

"Lando, please. There is no reason to be so formal. My father is the current head of the House and he is "Mister Mollari."

"Lando, then, we were a bit perplexed as to why you came to _Babylon Station 4_ at Epsilon Eridani with an important message for us. Can you tell us what it is and why it was so important that you come here to New Earth?"

"I bring some news from the Centaurum. I know that you have heard of the vote for the Royal Navy to intervene against the Dilgar, yes?"

"Yes, we have heard about that. I do believe that the Centauri Royal Navy will fit in well with our forces. Especially if you have a large number of the _Hyperion_, ah I mean the _Morado_ in your fleets."

"That is the problem here Fleet Lord. I bring news that the Royal Navy is needed along the Orieni front. You do know of the perfidious Orieni?"

"We know that their territory is on the spinward side of your Republic's space and you fought a war against them a few decades prior to our First Contact with your species. It was the Royal Navy who fought against us as well."

"That is true indeed, but the problem that has been brought up is that the Republic remembers the actions of the Orieni and we want to be prepared for them. Is the deployment of your fleets impacted by this?"

Londo was merely curios and did wonder if things would change between the Republic and the Hegemony if they backed out after telling the Terrans that they would fight alongside them. The Terrans did have two fleet groups who were on maneuvers in Republic space; could this be a bargaining chip that he could use?

"Before we get too hasty here gentlemen, perhaps the two Terran fleets could be sent back to you to fill in any holes in your prepared offensives?"

"No need Londo. Those fleets are fairly small and wouldn't be enough other than to up-size one of our own Task Forces. We made this commitment long ago and we do intend on keeping it. The Hegemony is not known to cut and run when things get bad."

Londo winced a bit at that last comment from the Fleet Lord in front on him, but covered it up with a long gulp of his scotch. Standing and going over to refill his glass with some more of the excellent amber liquid, he wondered if the Terrans could tell him where he could get more of the marvelous liquid. He was brought back to reality when the Fleet Lord thanked him and let Londo take the bottle with him back to his ship. This really was a good day for him.

***-EH-***

**Bureau 13 Headquarters  
Former Ch'lon **

The assembled staff of Bureau 13's main group of engineers, scientists, and those who paid for the endeavors all gathered around the table together to hear a report from the Fleet staff at New Earth.

"It is a bit distressing that the Centauri backed out like that."

"Not surprising really given their dealings with the Orieni."

"Didn't we scout out that part of their space when the _Constitutions_ were rampaging through their space?"

"We did, but we didn't find much of anything out there. Lots of dead systems and few smaller races, but nothing else really there."

"A shame then that the Centauri chickened out like that. It would have been interesting to see what they could really do in combat. They've changed so much of late, especially since Houses Tavari and Tromo joined up with us recently and we worked on several new weapons for them. The _Morado_ was just the start, but I guess the Royal Navy is going to deal with some other things instead.

"Perhaps we could use this to our advantage…"

All present thought about that last comment and they began to ponder what it could really be…

**A/N2:** I'll be updating the ships on my main page this next week, so keep an eye out for that along with getting back into the swing of things with my writing and posting schedule. Thanks for all of the favorites and reviews!


	15. Keep on Moving

**Chapter 14 Keep on Moving**

**AN**: Here's the next chapter. A bit more on the combat side of things. Didn't quite manage to keep to my own imposed posting cycle, I'll just blame it on Valentine's Day and my wife's birthday on the day after. So here it is...

As all sides began the New Year, 2231, they were waiting for something big to happen. They wouldn't be disappointed at all when it happened. As with some years, they start with a whimper or they start with a bang, and 2231 delivered with both.

The reluctance of the Centauri to commit to the Hegemony once they discovered a large Orieni force near their spinward border was not surprising; at least given the circumstances. The Hegemony could do it all themselves and the general plan was to do it this way. The only problem facing them was that even with the extra fleet from the former Babylon Defense Squadrons, they still did not have the needed fleet to meet the requirements of Operation _Chimera_.

Help as it had so often before came from an unexpected quarter (though most wouldn't be surprised by who it came from): Bureau 13 and their fleet decided to aid the HAF to carry out their audacious Operation _Chimera_ and still expect to win out over the Dilgar. The reputation of the Bureau's military was at a current high following the combat actions of the _Nemesis_ at Sorith and many were enamored of the Bureau's _Warlock_ line of warships. The hope that the Bureau could take on the role of the Royal Navy to smash the head from the snake was the hope of many within the HAF Navy. The HAF Army hoped that they would have the opportunity for combat as well.

The stage was set and the die was about to be cast, come what may…

***-EH-***

**Bureau 13 Coreward Depot World  
Location unknown**

Suspected by many, but never conclusively determined to exist, are the Bureau 13 depots. Even though the secretive agency was known to be based out of the former world of Ch'lon, many figured on the agency having other bases as well. It wasn't until the agency chose to reveal their true might just prior to the planned Operation _Chimera_ that the rest of the Hegemony and the League would learn just how powerful the organization actually was.

The upgrades of the _Babylon Stations_ were one step forward for Bureau 13 and the placement of the newly produced _Marathon_ Battle Cruisers was another step forward as well. The actions of the _THS Nemesis_ at Sorith showed just how powerful the new ship was for the Hegemony. That it remained within the remit of Bureau 13 alone was a source of contention within the Hegemony, especially the Hegemony Armed Forces as they expected to receive the powerful ships for their own use. Each of the _Warlocks_ could hold an entire Fighter Wing (128 Fighters in eight squadrons) making them useful when escort ships are added to the Squadron formation.

The multiple depot worlds (of which no one has been able to ascertain an actual set amount of them) of Bureau 13 were an eclectic mix of modern manufacturing capabilities, all with gravitics, and older techniques. Each of them was fully capable of building any of the warships as required for Bureau 13's fleet and they had been in full operation for over a century. New designs were incorporated into them as needed and older ships were retrofitted (if the cost was right) or rendered down to build the newer ships.

Each of these nascent ships were taken slowly out of their berths and brought to full operation. Unlike the ships of the HAF Navy, those operated by Bureau 13 have less than a quarter of the total shipboard personnel. This is more in keeping with their higher technology levels and the amount of artificial intelligence granted to the Bureau from the Kirishiacs during the long years of cooperation. The warships of the Bureau also were supported by a higher than normal level of nanoware in their operatives and crewmen. The higher nanoware augmentations, as evidenced on the special warfare operatives, is in fact higher than any other branch of the HAF (other than those employed by the Intelligence Division or Special Warfare Division).

Each of the ships slated to join Operation _Chimera_ were taken out of their berths and brought to full functionality. The fighter force was taken from garrisons all across the Hegemony, but the demand for the more advanced _Aurora_ instead of the _Nova_ was far higher than expected. The most ironic measure is that the Bureau's ships do not normally carry fighters, other than the _Warlock_; it is surprising that there was such a demand for the ultra-high tech _Aurora_ (given the experimental nature of its weapons and propulsion methods). Only those ships, like the _Nemesis_, could lay claim to the _Auroras_ in the Bureau's larder due to their combat experience or notoriety. Others in the Bureau's fleet would have to make due with the slightly less capable _Nova_ instead.

All told, the Bureau's fleet would encompass over twenty _Warlocks_ (a grand total of twenty three) and each would be escorted by a large number of _Artemises_ and _Marathons_. The lack of fighter launch capability in the _Artemis_ and _Marathon_ hulls was not a detriment given the number of Fighter Wings embarked on the _Warlocks_ they would escort into battle. Indeed the secondary weaponry on both classes of ships, the modular nature of which was attributed to the orbitals carried by them, would serve them well against the lightly armored Dilgar warships.

The other unique thought given form was that the Bureau's fleet had the ability to use the transphase jump drive. Combining Gravitic Dissipaters with Gravitic Augmenters, the Bureau's fleet could access a "higher" energy plane in hyperspace. This newly reached plane, reachable only due to the shields carried by the ships and the ability of the Gravitic Augmenter to force a wedge of gravitic energy ahead of each ship, allowed them to reach speeds of a significantly higher factor than the jump drives of the HAF Navy. The enhanced capability would be the reason why the Bureau Fleet could be used to strike at Omelos to land the final blow against the Dilgar. This position was previously held in reserve for the Centauri's Royal Navy.

***-EH-***

**HAF Naval Headquarters  
New Earth**

Once word came from Bureau 13 that they were activating fleet elements to take the place of the Centauri's Royal Navy, most within the HAF Navy were very skeptical that the Bureau would have a large enough fleet to make a difference. A few of the Fleet Lords remembered the performance of the Bureau's latest ship, as far as they could tell at least, and knew that the _Warlock_ line produced a very powerful ship. They were able to persuade a few of the more recalcitrant Fleet Lords to allow the Bureau to fill in, but a few of them were secretly hoping that the Bureau's fleet would be destroyed in a failed assault on Omelos. This way they could come in and "save" those few surviving fleet elements and could garner the glory of taking out the Dilgar's home system.

Work was still necessary to bring together all the various fleet elements that were needed for Operation _Chimera_. The full fleet elements were still going through a "rolling" upgrade to bring all of the ships to the new upgraded version. The upgrade encompassed adding in a set of Light Coilguns for the _Avenger_ and _Hyperion_ ships and changing out the turrets of the _Olympus_ with separated mounts for the Pulsed Ion Cannons and adding in the same quad barreled Light Coilgun mount on a newly designed turret. The Coilguns were added once data showed that the majority of Dilgar ships were very thinly armored and the main Pulsed Ion Cannons on HAF ships were overkill for most of the Dilgar fleet. The coilguns had an excellent range profile and could do heavy damage to the vast majority of the Dilgar's fleet.

In light of the upgrades, numerous supply positions would be needed to resupply HAF Navy ships and several resupply fleets would be put together also. The need for valid targets was also another concern and Bureau 13 agreed to work with the Intelligence Division to provide the combined Terran fleet with the most up-to-date intelligence. Heavily stealthed ships began to move into Dilgar space to acquire the locations for the majority of Warmasters with Jha'dur, her brother Sha'dur, and the Supreme Warmaster Gar'sen as the primary targets.

***-EH-***

**Jha'dur's Quarters  
Omelos**

"The word from Len'char is that the Centauri's Royal Navy is on their way to aid the Terrans. They were last seen at Centauri Prime, but we have not heard of them appearing anywhere in the Hegemony."

"That we know of Jha'dur. The Hegemony has a vast number of worlds that we have no idea ever existed. Their damnable Inside out worlds for example, no one knows a thing where they really are located."

"I know Ari. I just hate to see what might actually happen if the Centauri show up somewhere unexpected…"

"Like here at Omelos?"

"Exactly Ari, exactly. Just imagine if the combined with the Terrans and attacked us across a massive front."

"Or Jha'dur, what if they combine into a massive force and move slowly through our captured territory taking back each world after each other?"

"Do you truly think that would be possible? Or are you joking around with me?"

Jha'dur's thoughts went to that possibility. She didn't think it was at all possible to coordinate both the Terrans and the Centauri together for that particular venture. The early detection by Len'char of the Centauri's intentions was surprising given the incompetence of his earlier ventures. The attack on the Terran _Babylon Station_ was a poor enough example of Len'char's planning skills. It was only with some overt assistance from an alien species that Len'char's attack was able to go through and he was able to escape with his life and a small portion of his fleet.

"You know me by now. I don't joke like that. It is a valid thought, even if you don't like the idea Jha'dur."

She really didn't care for the thought, but being prepared was a good thing in her book. Her new _Stiletto_ was proof positive that times had truly changed for the Dilgar. They were forced to rely on other species to arm their ships and the thought made her angry. She had already seen the engineering reviews of Len'char's flagship and her own ship was rather impressive in comparison to it. They weren't quite the same kind of ship, but that was more from their own personal differences in how warfare should be fought than any other reason.

"Soon enough Ari, soon enough we can see what will happen. Return to your squadron and prepare them for a nasty fight. We've all seen some of what the Terrans have released about their defense of their _Babylon Station_ and they have a new fighter that we have not seen."

"I'll be ready and we will see it through after all."

Jha'dur certainly hoped that the misplaced optimism of Ari'shan would be born out. She desperately hoped that it would not end badly for them at all…

***-EH-***

_**Shadow Hunter Delta-6  
**_**Omelos Kuiper Belt**

Floating within the concealing cloud of unformed comets and other interstellar debris, the Bureau 13 scoutship was further shrouded by technology stolen from another First One race, the Torvalus. Famed for their ability to remain hidden, the Torvalus' Shading Field could render one of their ships undetectable (even to another First One race) and the _Shadow Hunters_ of the Bureau's fleet made use of such a device to keep them hidden as well.

The crew of _Hunter Delta-6_ had been here around Omelos for close to four months waiting and watching the Dilgar's home system. They had spent their time cataloguing a number of stations and other fixed defenses and finding the best way to circumvent the defensive measures. The Dilgar were remarkably like the Terrans when it came to defensive positions and in another time or place they might even have been allies of the Hegemony. Here and now, they were foes to be defeated.

As the crew went about their duties, the incredibly powerful scanning suite onboard the ship continued to scan the system in increments. They hoped not to miss anything that could spell failure for the Bureau fleet that they knew would be coming this way.

"Sir, I've detected the emergence of a small ship. It is not of Dilgar make or even League in design. Hold for a moment while I put it through the warbook." The technician's hands were not moving at all over the controls, but the nanoware interface that they had allowed their brain to interface directly with the systems instead.

"I've found a tentative match to a Drakh scoutship. It is moving behind one of the outer planets in a slow ballistic arc."

"Good work, log it and move on to the next section."

The anomaly that the ship's commander had found was more interesting to her than what had been found by her crewman. She had found something far more interesting in Omelos' star. It looked as though another race had modified the sequence of the star forwards in time through the use of a device to make it experience age far faster than normal. She wondered which race would do such a thing; then remembered that the Drakh were a thrall race of the Shadows. Perhaps conversely it was actually the Vorlons who caused the star to move towards an early nova in a bit to destroy a possible thrall race for the Shadows. Either way it did explain why the Dilgar had moved against the League in such a spectacular way.

That was more than likely, but the dynamics of the star would have to wait until the war was finished. She did examine, through the internal data network, a possible solution to "fix" the star, but that would have to wait. It was logged like the incident with the Drakh scoutship and would be duly reported to the Bureau.

Her thoughts then turned to when the next ship in line would replace them for this onerous duty. She hoped they would be allowed to return to Sigma 957 next. The Walker's titular homeworld should be interesting enough after all this time spent here at Omelos. Even going after the Tal'kona'sha would be more interesting than being here around Omelos.

***-EH-***

**HAF Naval Depot  
Near Quadrant 7**

The Ring World concept has allowed the Hegemony to build several systems that are completely unknown to any of the other races. This combined with the Terran jump drive has made finding these worlds almost impossible, a fact that has bedeviled the Vorlons for nearly two centuries. Each of the various Ring Worlds; at last count there were eight in full use and a ninth in production, have at their core a single world that is important enough to have the Ring World around them. Several of the larger complexes are around the _Babylon Station_ worlds or a primary manufacturing world, but a few (like the Bureau 13 complex) are in more secretive locations. The principal HAF Naval Depot near Quadrant 7, a fairly desolate world near the Drazi border, is one such location.

Built as a fortress world, in the off-chance of anyone actually finding it, the Naval Depot near Quadrant 7 is actually a collection of four Inside out worlds. The worlds all support the manufacture of warships, especially the _Olympus_ Destroyer and the specialty _Sagittarius_ Missile Ship. The foundries and manufacturing complexes had been in over drive to produce enough of the _Olympus_ hull so that every Cruiser-sized hull or larger could be escorted by at least two of the _Olympus_. Heavy combat was anticipated and the HAF Navy expected some heavy losses amongst their Task Force elements.

The other worlds that made up the Naval Depot near Quadrant 7 were dedicated to producing munitions, food, and spare parts for the HAF Navy. The coming campaign against the Dilgar would be sure to strain the logistics network in the Hegemony and several of the Naval Depots near the Centauri border were already shipping much of their production over to the League side of the Hegemony. All told, trillions of tons of supplies and shipping were moving closer and the Task Forces were being prepared for combat.

***-EH-***

**Tiree  
Markab Occupied Space**

The Dilgar had some thoughts of not dealing with the Markab due to their close ties with the Hegemony, but they still pushed forward with their invasion of Markab space. Starting off first with Troth, the Dilgar fleet quickly rolled over the scattered Markab fleets. They had expected to find more colonists, especially as the Markab had been cured of the _drafa_ plague long ago by the Terrans, but were pleased by the relative ease of their occupation. The Dilgar next set their sights on Tiree with a slightly larger population base and a possible Markab naval base. It also could have a larger and more sophisticated defense grid and so they decided to come prepared with a large number of fleets.

Jha'dur had overall control of the 1st and 2nd Strike Fleets (leading them from her new _Stiletto_) and the 1st and 2nd Line Fleets had joined her as well as a backup in case of heavy orbital defenses. Even with the large fleet group, Jha'dur remained apprehensive (she was but a short jump away from Hegemony space) as her fleet formed up in hyperspace before they jumped into the Tiree system.

Jha'dur had good reason to be afraid as the Tiree system was heavily defended by a large Markab fleet and fully supported by a very large defense grid modeled on the Terran standard (that is overlapping fields of fire from satellites carrying large weapons and supplemented with spacestations).

"Have the 2nd Strike Fleet come around to bring their main weaponry to bear on those spacestations. 1st Strike will continue onward to smash the Markab fleet. Have the Line Fleets stay behind, but have them ready to move forward as soon as they can."

Jha'dur's orders were carried out quickly by her experienced crew. Both her 1st Strike Fleet and the 2nd Strike Fleet were led by the new _Dagger_ class of ships. Their pentacans featured a number of modified _Mishakurs_ as well; the backbone of the Dilgar fleet modified with the best of the stolen League technologies from the Hyach and Abbai. Other smaller (relatively at that) ships were the smaller Dilgar destroyer analogues leading fleets of non-jump capable frigates into combat that came behind the main pentacans of Jha'dur's fleet. All told, the Dilgar fleet moved forward in an englobement maneuver that brought the heaviest ships of Jha'dur's fleet towards the Markab's smaller formation of ships. The two Line Fleets moved their fleets into a crescent while awaiting their chance at the Markab's fleet or defenses.

***-EH-***

**Terran Task Force 147  
Jump Space near Tiree**

The Terran practice of forming Task Forces from various Fleets has been used since combat operations against both the Koulani and the now extinct Ch'lonas led to the formation of the HAF Navy. The latest Task Force was just the first part of Operation _Chimera_ and other Terran fleets were set to attack other Dilgar fleets at Ekalta (Task Force 258), Zagros (Task Force 369), and Omelos (Task Force Serpent, Bureau 13's fleet) all at the same time. Only the Bureau's force had a long distance to travel, but they had already reported readiness.

The Dilgar attack on Tiree was too perfect to let go. While Jha'dur's fleet was focused on the Markab's defenses, the Terran fleet prepared to jump in using their phase shift drive for complete surprise over the Dilgar fleet. The more powerful sensors on the Terran ships were already reading the movement of Jha'dur's combined fleet and the Fleet Lord in charge of the Task Force prepared to give the order to jump into the system.

All told, Task Force 147 was composed of 174 combat ships (_Avengers_, _Hyperions_, and _Olympuses_) and all of them were ready to show the Dilgar why it was such a bad idea to even attack a Terran world. This fleet total didn't even include the 36 _Sagittarius_ Missile Ships that were held in deep reserve for a massive saturation blitz of the Dilgar Fleet if it was necessary. Most didn't think that it would be necessary, but the long military history of the Terrans had them preparing for any eventuality.

With a single thought given through the communications network, the Terran fleet made their transition to normal space without the overly dramatic opening of jump points. The power that would have normally have gone to the "standard" jump engines was instead routed to the Hypergraviton Cannons across the fleet and now the cannons were preparing for a massed salvo of multiple shots. Now fully prepared, they appeared "behind" the Dilgar fleet and opened fire in a massive display of firepower.

***-EH-***

_**Wings of the Maker  
**_**Markab **_**Shafab**_** Heavy Cruiser  
Tiree**

"Great Maker! Sensors, confirm gathered telemetry."

The vast appearance of a massive Terran fleet surprised the Markab commander greatly. He had at first expected to be ground down slowly by the Dilgar Fleet arrayed against him. Now, he had some hope. He had heard of the capabilities of the Terran ships, but had not actually believed it. Now he knew that they were powerful, far more powerful than his own species.

"Confirmed Commander… the fleet reads as Terran! We are saved!"

The method of transference from hyperspace by the Terrans reminded him of another race, one that was a foe of his people. He didn't know where it was found, but he decided to look it up. The Terrans had been very good to his people, his own lifemate had contracted the _drafa_ plague and she was cured of it. It was probably nothing at all, but he was uneasy about their entry from hyperspace. That unease was lifted as the Terrans opened fire and obliterated both the 1st and 2nd Line Fleets that had been held in reserve.

Even Jha'dur's main fleet had not been fortunate enough to escape damage from the Terrans. Space was full of solid shot being fired at the Dilgar ships and streams of energy as well. Missiles were being fired as well and very little of the Dilgar was prepared to deal with such a massive display of firepower.

"Sir, I am reading a large number of fighters streaming past from the Terran ships. They appear to be carrying a large number of missiles and are firing on the Dilgar ships."

"Keep the defense grid on standby. I don't want it to open fire on the Terrans. Keep us back as well and permission is given to fire on any Dilgar ships that get too close to us."

"Orders are going out now sir. What do we do now?"

What indeed? Looking around the bridge of his flagship, the Markab commander made a wise decision.

"Stay put and enjoy the show. The Terrans have shown us that they truly are our friends. The Dilgar have unwisely provoked the Terrans and we have as the Terrans would say: 'a front row seat to the action.'"

***-EH-***

_**Stiletto  
**_**Tiree**

The shock of the Terran attack had caught the Dilgar completely by surprise. The destruction of the two Line Fleets "behind" her own fleets had destroyed over 200 ships, ships that would have been used to finish off the Markab. The same Markab defensive line that was now fully locked down and was repulsing her ships with regular fury.

"What's going on Captain An'jash?"

"Warmaster, it looks like the Terrans have jumped in system and they completely bypassed our pickets in hyperspace as well. They wiped out the 1st and 2nd Line Fleets completely and are currently doing a starburst maneuver."

Jha'dur wondered why they were doing that particular maneuver, especially now, then it dawned on her…

"Quickly, have the fleet move away at top speed. Scatter them all now Captain!"

The short pause before her order was carried out doomed the vast majority of Jha'dur's 1st Strike Fleet and the 2nd Strike Fleet fared no better. Coming out of the center of the Terran fleet's starburst maneuver was the large bombardment fleet that had just come out of hyperspace. Preceding the ships was a large missile salvo, far larger than any Jha'dur had ever seen. She was a bit impressed that she merited such a response from the Terrans. At any other time, she might even have been a bit proud that she deserved such a response, but here and now she was simply afraid of those missiles.

Missiles, of all shapes and sizes, came out of the starburst maneuver from the Terran Task Force. Ranging in size from the "standard" graviton (phased gravitic warhead) missile all the way up to a massive Gigaton yield model; the missile swarm was programmed for multiple kill types. The standard burst pattern created an explosion that was directed into a sphere of atomic energies and only the first part of the salvo was set to this pattern in order to take out any fighters that attempted to shoot down the missiles. The next pattern was the "standard" anti-ship setup that directed the atomic energies into a cone that directed most of it into a ship's hull; the vast majority of those missiles fired used this particular pattern. The final pattern was one of the deadlier used by the Hegemony and only on those missiles with a yield over 100 Megatons. This pattern used the same gravitics on all of the other graviton missiles to turn the atomic energies into a beam weapon of incredible power. The last series of missiles that streaked toward the flat-thrusted Dilgar fleet was of this type. They were there to ensure the destruction of the Dilgar fleet.

Very little of this was of any concern to Jha'dur at this moment, instead she was attempting to save her own life and by extension the lives of her fleet. Her orders went by without response as they came far too late to save but a few of her ships.

A bevy of explosions lit up space around the 1st and 2nd Strike Fleets as spherical bursts of atomic fury denuded their fighter line. Conical bursts lit up multiple warships and where these jets of atomic fury struck, little remained of the ships struck in such a way. The more insidious of the Terran missiles struck with large beams of energy with outputs so far in excess of any other race that the Dilgar wondered if First Ones were attacking them. The beams, short-lived as they were, slashed through multiple thin-skinned Dilgar warships before they cut out sowing death throughout the Dilgar fleet and leaving few intact ships alive. The vast majority of ships had either been destroyed outright or cut to ribbons by the Terran missiles.

Soon enough, the once mighty 1st and 2nd Strike Fleets had joined the 1st and 2nd Line Fleets in death. Only the _Stiletto_ and one other of the _Dagger_ class remained untouched, protected as they were by their stolen technology. Both ships raced around the world of Tiree to escape the planet's gravity well so that they could jump into hyperspace.

It seemed that the universe had decided to play a cruel joke on Jha'dur after all; as both of the ships moved through space, a jump point appeared before them. Exiting from the point was an oddly shaped ship; it was blueish in color and appeared to be like a great fish going through the stars. Greenish-yellow beams of intense energy speared through the _Kukri_ and destroyed the ship with all hands. Jha'dur's own _Stiletto_ was speared by the same beams, but instead of killing her ship it was instead disabled by them.

Jha'dur could only watch in horror as her ship was brought towards the alien ship. There was nothing that she could do nothing at all…

***-EH-***

Operation _Chimera_ had started off easily enough for the Hegemony. The combat operations at Tiree were more than successful as all four of the Dilgar fleets were completely destroyed. The only snag was that the supreme Warmaster of the fleet, Jha'dur, had not been found nor was her ship among the wreckage. Cleanup would take a while, but the Markab were more than happy to deal with it as the Terran fleet began to reform in case they were needed for other operations nearby.

The fleet actions at Ekalta and Zagros went just about as well as what happened at Tiree with the Dilgar fleets destroyed and the influential Warmasters killed in combat. The Brakiri were beyond surprised when the Terran Task Force 258 appeared in Ekalta and destroyed the Dilgar fleet that was bombarding their world. The humanitarian supplies provided by the Terrans went a long way towards easing some of the problems caused by the Dilgar's mass driver attacks. The Dilgar had been caught without a guard in system, mistakenly believing that a picket in hyperspace was enough for their security. That lack of proper security in-system was transmitted back to the HAF Naval Command for any follow-up operations, if they were needed.

The Terran attack on Zagros was a bit different as the Dilgar were still engaged in combat operations with the Drazi there. Stro'kath had brought several of his people in a series of rag-tag fleets against the Dilgar. The appearance of Task Force 369 surprised both the Dilgar and the Drazi. Stro'kath had to rein in his own people to prevent them from firing on the Terran fleet. While the fleet action was surprising to both sides, the more disciplined Dilgar under the command of Warmaster Dar'sen were able to force a far tougher fight for the Terrans (aside from Bureau 13's tough fight over Omelos) than had happened up to this point.

The Dilgar were able to keep the Drazi fleet in a position that fouled the Terran fleet's lines with "friendly" ships always nearby to a Dilgar ship. This act of maneuvering infuriated the Fleet Lord in charge of the fleet and he almost ordered his Task Force to open fire regardless of who was in the way. His second-in-command gave him an idea to split up each of the Task Force's component Fleets to allow them to engage the Dilgar on a semi-even footing. The disciplined Terran Fleets split further into their Squadron formations and sent their fighters out in their Wing formations rather than the larger Group formations as originally planned.

Each of the smaller Terran Squadrons was able to maneuver far easier than the small Drazi groupings of fleets. Instead of being "in the way," the Drazi fleets instead were passed by a shoal of Terran ships that went past them quickly. Engaging the Dilgar ships in smaller units, the Terran fleet was truly in their element (most of the Task Force's elements had come from the newest Fleet, the 9th Support Fleet, which worked in smaller formations instead of as a full "Fleet") as they maneuvered and brought their weaponry to bear on their enemy. Unlike the operations at both Tiree and Ekalta, the Terran Task Force was unable to fire off a massive missile barrage, but the ships of the various Squadrons were well supplied to plenty of munitions and ammunition for their coilguns.

The upgrades to all of the Terran ships to the more deadly Hypergraviton Cannons to replace the older Battle Lasers (of a Terran design that enhanced the previous Centauri design) along with replacing all of the older PIUC (Pulse Ion/Ultramatter Cannons) to a somewhat lighter PIC (Pulsed Ion/Coilgun) was born out in combat against the thin-skinned ships of the Dilgar. The lack of forward launch tubes on both the _Avenger_ and the _Hyperion_ was questioned by many and they received the reason why when those particular ships went into combat with quad barreled light coilguns mounted on the front of each of those ships and in the new turrets built for the _Olympus_ Destroyers. These light coilgun groups proved to be incredibly deadly as they fired off projectiles that shattered armor on the Dilgar's ships, while they proved to be of little use against a Terran ship (due to the Gravitic Augmenter present on each ship) if they happened to be in a position where they could be struck by "friendly fire."

As the Terran Task Force split apart into the component Fleets and later into their component Squadrons, they quickly overwhelmed the Dilgar pentacans as they tried to engage their new opponent. Into this melee, the Drazi entered with their particle weaponry firing quickly. Doing little good, they did distract both sides as Stro'kath tried and failed to get his people into an appropriate battle formation. Eventually the stronger Terran fleet began to make a difference against the Dilgar fleet and they also began to make a difference against the chaotic Drazi fleet. As each Dilgar pentacan was destroyed or reduced in strength, the Drazi would pounce like a carrion eater on a crippled foe, this repeated multiple times until the Dilgar strength was completely removed from combat.

With the last of the Dilgar strength pushed into a small grouping of ships, the Terran were able to unleash their massive missile salvo that would have ended the fleet, had they not jumped into hyperspace. Destroyers were sent out to chase these ships in hyperspace, but the same pickets that had been overlooked came into their own. They caused such a disruption of hyperspace that the Terran _Olympuses_ were unable to find the outbound Dilgar ships in the chaos, even with their enhanced sensor suites.

This failure to stop a small handful of ships, less than 20, from escaping was duly reported to higher authorities. Their later impact was deemed less than meaningful and word of their escape was not passed on to other commands outside the HAF Navy, of which was Bureau 13's fleet that was enroute to Omelos at this time.

***-EH-***

**Task Force Serpent  
En-route to Omelos**

Bureau 13's fleet of ships was slowly making their way towards Omelos. They had at first used their transphase drives to reach the trading world of Tirrith as their first stop-off location to reform the fleet. This operation went smoothly, but the later stages were fraught with delays and other situations that led to a number of snap judgments that could have repercussions for the fleet.

The first problem that marred the deployment of the Task Force was a massive storm in hyperspace that prevented the Terran fleet from using the main hyperspace route from Tirrith to Tirolus. Using the dead world would have given the fleet an easy passage to Omelos, but the hyperspace storm forced the fleet to use a little known route that took them towards the Dilgar colony of Innata. The world has originally intended to be used only as a fallback position, but the hyperspace storm was too dangerous to travel inside (even with the advanced jump drives on the Bureau's ships).

The next problem to occur was that even with their advanced sensors, the Bureau's fleet became lost and it took more than twelve hours for them to reform. The Captains in charge were new at their job, but it did not excuse the blunder. The entirety of Task Force Serpent was finally all together and they were ready for combat. Moving into their formations, the separate combat elements all deployed their fighters and prepared for their jump into the Dilgar's main systems.

***-EH-***

**Task Force Serpent  
Omelos**

The first hint of something bad happening in the Omelos system was the quiet extermination of the Drakh listening post in system by the _Shadow Hunter Delta-7_ just prior to the rest of the Bureau's fleet jumping in. The Drakh base was systematically destroyed by Hypergraviton beams and then finished off with a salvo of graviton missiles. With the destruction of the Drakh's main base, the first ships of Task Force Serpent jumped into the Omelos system using their phase shift drives. Part of the fleet came first and positioned themselves near to the Jump Gate in the system and at several of the Lagrange Points (those points in the Omelos system where gravity was at its least) to effectively blockade the system. Mines were released prior to their reversion, but the currents in hyperspace would make those mines of little use, though many within the Task Force didn't foresee their being in the system all that long anyway.

The vast majority of the fleet then appeared using a "standard" series of jump points; it was postulated that seeing so many jump points opening in one location would be a hefty psychological hit against the Dilgar. The number of jump points was calculated and a large number of them did not disgorge warships, but rather a number of missiles that began destroying the orbital defenses over Omelos. Larger ships of the Task Force began to use their Hypergraviton Blasters to take out the larger defense satellites and stations in orbit of Omelos.

The Dilgar at first were surprised to see such a large fleet and without any word at all from their intelligence assets that such an attack was planned (aside from some reports of the Centauri joining the Hegemony). With Terrans fighters, all of a design that was unknown to the Dilgar, and countless warships that had not been seen before the Dilgar were taken by complete surprise. The heavy weapons used against them resulted in significant overkill and the hulks of their ships littered space and caused a number of problems for both the Dilgar and the Terrans.

Fighter squadrons dueled with individual fighters and missiles flew at each other in the void. The completely unknown Terran fighter, the ultra-high tech _Aurora_, proved to be too much for the out-matched _Thorun_. Even those elite squadrons who were retained to defend Omelos were smashed aside like chaff. The previous use of Destroyers and Frigates to counter the better Terran fighters was smashed as well as these fighters had even more powerful defensive systems that made the plasma weaponry of the Dilgar ships useless against them. With few other alternatives, larger ships attempted to stop the Terran fighters, but were unable to do so as the larger Terran ships came to their aid.

Much like the fleet action at Tiree, bombardment ships (in this case those ships who had orbitals outfitted with graviton missiles) were not seen, but clouds of missiles were unleashed continually at the Dilgar's ships and spacestations. The modular nature of the Bureau's ships, typified in the orbitals used across the fleet, allowed many of the large and small ships to mount graviton missiles in large numbers along with other dangerous weaponry. Hypergraviton Cannons, as mounted on the vast majority of the ships, and Hypergraviton Blasters made short work of any Dilgar ships that tried to take out a Terran ship. The defensive systems, namely the Gravitic Dissipaters and Gravitic Augmenters, were used heavily to prevent damage to countless Terran ships.

Considered by many to be a tool of last resort, ramming became the only method that the Dilgar had left. Countless smaller ships attempted to slam into Terran ships. Once again the Gravitic Augmenters carried by every ship were switched to an alternate function that used gravitic waves to "push" aside Dilgar ships. The large numbers of Dilgar ships that still had some maneuvering engines available were able to cause some casualties, usually among the smaller _Artemises_, on the Terran fleet.

***-EH-***

**Excerpt from **_**In the Company of the Angels of Death**_**, by John J. Sheridan, New Avalon Press 2281**

_Prologue_

_If I had told my father of where I would end up at the tender age of 13, he most likely would have taken me back home just prior to my ending up at the Bureau 13 War Academy. I had won an appointment, more due to my own accomplishments than my father's position as Ambassador, thanks to my skill in piloting a simulated _Tiger_ in an arcade. It was one of those stories that every young man yearns for; being selected because I'm good at flying a fictional fighter in a video game, but that's what really happened to me. I _was_ selected because of that very reason. It delighted my father to no end, but my mother and siblings weren't too happy about it. Even with the revised schooling methods, namely my nanoware provided much of my early classes, family was still a big thing in the Hegemony (still is to tell the truth)._

_Why do I bring this point up here?_

_I'll tell you why, it led to my placement in the 41__st__ Fighter Wing. The 41__st__ is better known as the _Angels of Death_ and I was brevetted to command of one of the component squadrons before I even graduated from the Bureau's War Academy. Here I was a young man, just barely a teenager, and I had command over sixteen of my peers. We had been rushed through training and then given the reins of the deadliest fighter in the Hegemony inventory, at least in my less than knowledgeable experience, the _Aurora_. Much has been written about the _Aurora_ and much of it is mere conjecture. Take it from a pilot who took one through the maelstrom that was Omelos, I know what that fighter can do in combat._

_The 41__st__ was given a place of honor on the _THS Nemesis_ and we were there when "Mean Joe" Tennant, that is Fleet Lord Joseph Tennant, gave the traditional Maori Warrior chant on the bridge of his ship. He was decked out in the traditional grass skirt worn over his uniform and everything. It was mighty impressive to watch and for those of us youngsters we were in awe of "Mean Joe." We had all heard of his exploits at Sorith and were sure that we would see combat with him. Unfortunately all those _romantic_ notions about combat get battered away when you watch your fellows go to war and see them die in front of you and know that it could have been you instead who died._

-I-

_Our squadron was shot out of the _Nemesis'_ main fighter bays rather quickly and we were into the main part of the battle. It was chaotic, far more than any simulator engagement or other training could prepare us. I was able to keep my squadron together, more my dint of the nanoware in my body than anything else, we stayed fairly tight knit because of our nanoware. The shared targeting data and the ability to respond far quicker than a _mere flesh-and-blood_ pilot really kept us alive and in combat for quite some time. _

_Our better armed fighters, far more so than the old _Tigers_, was why we were able to last in combat so much easier than before. The addition of small fighter-scale Gravitic Dissipater helped even more, at least in my opinion. We could shrug off everything the Dilgar's frigates and destroyers could throw at us and when they unleashed their larger ships, our own larger ships kept them away from us. We found out that the main gun on our fighters, a product of the Bureau's clandestine research, was powerful enough to take out a Dilgar cruiser (if you hit the right spot, that is)._

_I got to see the end of Omelos when the _Nemesis_ in a large group of _Warlocks_ went toe-to-toe with the defense grid over Omelos. It was an awe inspiring sight to behold. "Mean Joe" had his ship configured for heavy combat, not unlike when he was at Sorith, and he was laying down all of his considerable firepower on the Dilgar. It wasn't just him in that fight, but he certainly carried it to completion. There are other accounts, but I can safely say that I was nearby when he rained fire on the Dilgar's chief bunkers on the surface of Omelos. It was sad for those who were civilians on the surface of the world, but watching the _Nemesis_ rain down fire like her namesake, it is something that will forever be ingrained in my mind._

***-EH-***

The aftermath of combat operations by the various elements of Operation _Chimera_ didn't end when Omelos fell to the Hegemony. Even the vast majority of the Dilgar's Strike Fleets had been destroyed in combat operations against the HAF Navy; there still were a few of the second-line Line Fleets who remained in operation. Cleansing operations were carried out by the HAF Navy in Squadron-sized formations, but still the Dilgar managed to hide themselves in hyperspace.

Attention soon turned to the world of Mitoc, a former League planet. Mitoc had been captured early on by the Dilgar and the indigenous population had been killed by the Dilgar. What was left of the world was now home to the last Emperor of the Dilgar and the "best and brightest" of his world. It was here that the true "final" battle of the world would take place. The Emperor had called home a large quantity of his troops, at least those who had transport capability, and the world became a fortress (not quite to the quality of Omelos).

At the instigation of the HAF Army, the Navy was finally forced to concede that the Army had a role to play. With their own transport ships, the HAF Army was ready to storm Mitoc, even if they had to do it on their own. The Navy wasn't able to support the Army due to their interception duties, but Bureau 13 stepped forward and offered to provide the Army with ships to protect them. Formed into convoys, the various RCTs were fully screened by the Bureau's battered fleet.

Next stop: Mitoc.

***-EH-***

**Mitoc**

Featured on the surface of Mitoc were the surviving members of the Dilgar Imperium's ruling classes and their surviving military. Ten divisions of "regulars," two Stormtrooper divisions, and three Guard divisions (the last of the elite Guards) were all that remained of the Dilgar's military. All other units had been cut off by the destruction of the Strike and Line Fleets by the Hegemony's military. A few surviving warships were in orbit, but they were not expected to survive at all against the HAF Navy's ships. In fact the captains had been told to sell themselves as much as they could to prevent any ships from getting to the orbit of Mitoc.

The Dilgar army chose to site their bunkers and other military installations among the surviving civilians of their government. A few orbital defenses were in place, but they would be too little to stop the Hegemony. Civilians were drafted and given assault rifles. Homes were transformed into bunkers and booby trapped. The Dilgar would fight on to the last man instead of surrendering. Without the majority of the Warmasters, those few who were part of the Warmaster Council who actually led combat fleets, the remaining members were those too old to be effective in combat. It fell to these members to hold the line against the Hegemony that was sure to come.

***-EH-***

**HAF Army Staging Area  
Hyperspace near Mitoc**

The RCTs of the HAF Army gathered in hyperspace to discuss the actual war plans for the invasion of Mitoc. War Lord Alexi Denisov in command of the 1st RCT was given overall command of the HAF Army's response to the Dilgar. The abilities of the component Regiments that were a part of each RCT was well known to Army leaders, but few others were aware of what they could do in combat. While the HAF Navy was respected and feared, the Army remained an unknown and the action at Mitoc would change that for the Army.

The combined fleet of ships, the transports for the various RCTs and Bureau 13's surviving ships, had made their way to just outside the Mitoc system. They had decided that the use of strategic level graviton missiles were feasible, keeping in mind that they would only be used against blatantly military targets. The multi-gigaton graviton missiles were carried on the _Sagittarius _Missile Ships to be used by order of the War Lord in charge of each individual RCT. In this case, the world of Mitoc was almost uniformly military in nature and it would be a good place to see if these graviton missiles could be used as effectively against a planetary surface as they were against warships.

The typical, if such a thing could be called typical, plan for the insertion of Army elements always involved the use of strategic munitions on the planetary surface. The pacification of Ch'lon by Bureau 13 in the early 2100's showed that the _Tyches_ of the HAF Navy were well suited to this role, especially when using tactical nuclear munitions and antimatter when fired by their spinal Heavy Coilguns. The large _Novas_ also feature a pair of spinal Heavy Coilguns and it was expected that they would deliver a multitude of specialty munitions during the invasion of Mitoc.

The CAAN combat teams would be the first to drop on Mitoc and would work in their traditional role of sabotage and spotting for the heavier Army elements. The six CAAN Regiments received their assigned operations areas and the elite commands were concerned about forcing entry. Even with _Warlocks_ to support them in making orbit, the older _Tyches_ of the CAAN formations were close to a century old and their captains didn't expect them to survive combat. The dropships would be hard pressed to deal with the Dilgar defenses in order to get their troops to the surface safely. It was hoped that the Dilgar had not had enough time to fully defend their new capitol world.

The follow up attacks of the Army Regiments, which were configured mainly as Mechanized Regiments with their component Battalion Combat Teams (BCTs) being infantry heavy (albeit Battle Armored troops), were set to provide the maximum amount of firepower needed for each operations area. The hope that the Bureau's fleet and their own support ships would be able to provide orbital fire was present in the minds of many of the commanders, but they also knew that space combat could shift quickly. Since each RCT was designed to be fully self-contained, they would be capable of combat operations on their own. The battle for Mitoc would justify the expense of outfitting the RCTs and the troops all knew that their reputation was on the line; unlike the CAAN units, who already had combat experience.

***-EH-***

**Mitoc**

The Dilgar defenders of their Emperor had hoped that they would have enough time to prepare for the inevitable assault by the Hegemony. They ran out of time when pickets in hyperspace picked up a massive fleet heading towards their world. Thinking that it was the Hegemony fleet that was coming to destroy them, the pickets launched a suicidal assault on it. It wasn't until the picket got close enough to identify the fleet did they see that it was actually a large fleet of League ships.

The League had realized that things had changed, especially when the Brakiri were freed from their confinement by the appearance of the HAF Navy. Quickly freeing their own worlds from their Dilgar occupiers, they formed larger fleets of a multi-national bent and decided to take the war to the Dilgar. The mix of Abbai, Hyach, Cascor (mostly in the form of fighters), Vree, and Brakiri ships formed the ad-hoc force. It was more telling that the Yolu, Markab, and Drazi did not make up the force. The politics of the situation was complex and the fleet was racing towards the world of Mitoc in order to force the Dilgar to end their war against the League. The loss of so many Warmasters was hurting the Dilgar, but they remained ready for any attacks.

It was into this mess of politics that the HAF Army chose to jump into the situation. Chaotic ship formations moved through the vacuum of space and fighters flitted around the formations as well. As with so many plans, the Great Murphy had struck again and rendered the carefully considered plan moot. The CAAN formations chose to continue on and were supported by heavier ships of the Bureau's fleet. Many of the Bureau's ships still bore scars from their battle over Omelos, but they powered through the maelstrom of ships and weapons fire. The Gravitic Dissipaters on the _Warlocks_ were enough to stop all but the heaviest shots from the League's fleet, most notably the Hyach's powerful spinal lasers, and anything else was ignored as the _Warlocks_ moved towards Mitoc. The smaller _Tyches_ came through the storm intact thanks to the sacrifice of the Bureau's fleet.

Landing operations began as soon as the _Tyches_ of the CAAN teams reached orbit over Mitoc. _Warhawk_ gunships began flying directly from the _Tyches_ and escorted the dropships down to the surface of the planet, each going to their respective operations areas. Power Armored troops jumped out of the _Warhawks_ as they came through the upper atmosphere of the planet and used their antigravity systems to deploy silently towards the enemy below. Flights of _Banshees_ (the premier aerospace fighter in the Hegemony) came down from orbit and used pin-point munitions to strike at specific targets, most notably anti-aircraft/spacecraft batteries and any field guns that had been spotted from orbit. Following up these Power Armored infantrymen were the Cruiser tanks, the swift _Sleipnir_ that supported their combat operations.

With a flash that lit the entire hemisphere, the first of the strategic munitions began to strike the surface of Mitoc. Multi-gigaton munitions and "smaller" Megaton yield munitions sought out large military targets and the laagers for the Dilgar Divisions on the world. Follow-up strikes by antimatter from the Heavy Coilguns in orbit were joined by pin-point strikes from the _Warlocks_ in orbit that caused entire continents to shake as if struck by the hand of God. Only the elite formations of the Dilgar Army survived, if only because of their greater experience. The untested Divisions were destroyed almost to a man by the opening salvos used against them. Strikes by gunships and tanks caused many more casualties before the main Army BCTs came down to the surface of the world.

Desultory strikes from ground positions rang out against the dropships of the BCTs as they pushed forward. Several of the dropships disgorged their cargo of _Raiden_ suited Powered Armor as they pushed back towards the _Novas_ in orbit. Much like the lighter _Thor_ Power Armor suit used by the CAAN formations, the _Raiden_ was able to use the antigravity systems onboard to move towards the surface. Heavier dropships brought in _Odin_ armored vehicles (Infantry tanks) and once these dropships had dropped off their cargo they returned back to orbit. With the vast majority of their heavy equipment on the surface of Mitoc, the BCTs began to form up and left for their operations areas.

Approaching the 1st RCT's position on Mitoc was the surviving elements from the 35th Guards Division of the Dilgar Army. The 35th Guards was one of the few Dilgar formations that made use of their armored vehicles. Compared to the massive _Odin_, the Dilgar tank was little better than a lightly armored vehicle. It featured a small plasma cannon, but no missiles of any kind. The _Odin_, on the other hand, featured a pair of Interceptor Grid cannons on the main turret and a brace of mini-graviton missiles. Tank on tank, it was no contest for the actual winner between the Dilgar and the Hegemony. Adding in the ultra-swift _Sleipnir_ of the CAAN combat teams and the Dilgar were certainly on the shorter end of things when it came to armored protection.

On every avenue, the Dilgar tried to keep the HAF Army back from their palace. It was only by dint of having an actual army did the Hegemony keep the League from interfering with the ground campaign on Mitoc. The larger _Warlocks_ holding station in geosynch orbits over the Emperor's palace kept the League from bringing fire onto the palace; not that the League didn't try to exact punishment on the last Dilgar Emperor. It was only when the Bureau's other ships came into the system and supported the large _Warlocks_ did the League decide to take out their petty wrath on the few remaining installations that belonged to the Dilgar in the system.

Slowly and surely, the RCTs on the ground began to grind away at the Dilgar Divisions facing off against them. Tragedy struck the 4th RCT when a Brakiri _Avioki_ decided to strike a series of ground targets while one of the 4th RCT's component BCTs was close to a Dilgar formation. A salvo of graviton bolts from the Brakiri ship destroyed over half of the BCT. The _Avioki_ didn't last much longer as it was quickly destroyed by a Terran _Warlock_ for their impertinence. To prevent any further incidences, the Terran fleet commander ordered all League ships away from the surface of Mitoc under pain of destruction for any ship that did not follow their order. The seconds ticked down until they had to be away from the planet, but the League ships moved away and were watched by the gun sights of multiple Terran ships (all of which wanted the League to move closer and give them a good reason to execute them for their attacks on Terran citizens).

Indifferent to the drama going on in orbit, the Dilgar Divisions were slowly collapsing from the strain placed on them by the HAF Army. Only the Stormtrooper Division was keeping the other Dilgar forces in the fight, through coercion alone. The Dilgar were just about to collapse and it was only their own bullies that kept them in the fight against the HAF Army. Forced back to a final perimeter around the compound selected by the Emperor, the remaining Dilgar Divisions chose to fortify their perimeter. For three days, the HAF Army completed their encirclement of the Dilgar position. Every attempt to break out was firmly repulsed by the RCTs surrounding them with every attempt made to prevent casualties on both sides. This response surprised the Dilgar mightily and many attempted to join the break out attempts, if only to be "captured" by the Terrans and away from their tormentors. Pretty soon only the Stormtroopers remained as the defenders with an even smaller number of the Regulars, those who couldn't escape.

A single messenger from the HAF Army came forward, one of the massive _Odin_ tanks, but with the main turret turned around. It was flying a white flag and broadcasting that it was coming in peace. The commander of the Stormtroopers wanted to immediately fire on the tank with the few surviving heavy weapons, but was over-ruled by the Emperor. He could "see the writing on the wall" and wanted to know what the Terrans wanted to say to him. The tank advanced slowly and came to a complete stop just ahead of the armored gate for the compound. A single trooper came out of the tank and presented a rolled and sealed scroll to the guard at the gate and returned to his tank, which then reversed and left.

Intrigued by what could be on the scroll, but in awe of his Emperor, the guard brought the scroll in for him. The Emperor cleared out the entire chamber and read the note that called for his immediate surrender. The Terrans promised to keep them safe from the League until an impartial court could be convened to deal with war crimes. If he agreed to the terms, then the Hegemony would keep him safe. Otherwise, he could hope that the League wouldn't execute him immediately. With little choice and the weight of his crumbling world falling around him, the Emperor made a tough decision. He chose to honor the agreement struck with the Hegemony and ordered his troops to surrender to them and them alone.

Once word came to the fleet in orbit around Mitoc, the League attempted to force the Terran fleet away from the planet. Instead, the HAF Army transports and the Bureau's fleet closed ranks above the Dilgar Emperor's palace. With their weapons fully prepared for combat, the Hegemony would on pain of death keep the League away. Riots erupted across the League as they found out that the Dilgar had surrendered and their forces were unable to exact a measure of revenge on them. The League became happy that a court would be summoned to deal with war crimes and many within the League hoped that the entirety of the Dilgar race would be exterminated because of their actions in the war. Peace had come to the Dilgar and they had no other choice but to accept it.

**AN:** Here's the end to the Dilgar arc of the story. The next few chapters will (I envision only about 4 more for the story) bring it to an end.

Some of you may have questions concerning how the Hegemony sets up their fleet formations, here is a description of the basic structure of the Hegemony's fleet.

The Open Fleet, those ships that adhere to the Treaty of Vega, is one of three classes: the _Olympus_ Destroyer, _Hyperion_ Cruiser (32), and _Avenger_ Carrier (64). The Hidden Fleet, or better known as the ships built specifically for Bureau 13, is one of three additional classes: the _Artemis_ Frigate, _Marathon_ Battle Cruiser, and _Warlock_ Heavy Carrier (128).

The Open Fleet was intended to be built around a full Fighter Wing that is 128 Fighters (arranged in eight squadrons of sixteen fighters) carried by the ships of the fleet. The first three fleets built for the HAF Navy were built around a Carrier as the main component of each fleet. HAF Naval doctrine is that every cruiser-sized ship should be escorted by at least a pair of Destroyers. Carriers are to be escorted by no less than four Destroyers.

The component squadrons of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Fleets are composed of a single _Avenger_, two _Hyperions,_ and eight _Olympuses_. Four of these Squadrons make up each of these Fleets, giving them a Full Carrier Group (512 Fighters). The 4th, 5th, and 6th Fleets have a different component squadron formation; two squadrons follow the format of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Fleet's squadrons. The other squadrons are Cruiser heavy, meaning that they have four _Hyperions_ and eight _Olympuses_. This still yields a full Wing for the component squadrons, but also a bit more utility for most combat operations. The later 7th, 8th, and 9th Fleets are composed solely of Cruiser squadrons, mostly due to their predilection for independent operations. The former Babylon Defense Squadrons were Cruiser heavy as well, but only had a partial Fighter Group (meaning that they only had three squadrons versus the four of the "regular" fleet groups). For Operation _Chimera_, the former Babylon Defense Squadrons were added to each of the HAF Navy Fleets giving them a reinforced Fighter Group (640 Fighters).

The Bureau's Fleet is built on a different structure. Both the _Artemis_ and the _Marathon_ do not carry fighters due to the _Warlock's_ principle function as a Heavy Carrier. Each _Warlock_ is usually escorted by no less than six of the _Artemis_ Frigates. The _Marathons_, first seen as defenders for the _Babylon Stations_, are usually deployed with only a pair of _Artemises_ as they are built more for independent operations. For Operation _Chimera_, Fleet Groups were built around the _Warlocks_ with heavy support from _Marathon_-led Squadrons as escorts for the larger ships. The "usual" format was for a single _Marathon_ to be escorted by four _Artemises_ and each _Warlock_ was escorted by four of the _Marathon_-led Squadrons.


	16. Endings

**AN:** Been a little while since I've posted up anything for this story. It isn't abandoned or forgotten, the muse has fled for a bit into the Thrawn Trilogy & Duology along with a few other SW novels and the Greg Mandel series. Before that was a mess of 40K novels. As it was, this chapter fought me for quite a bit of time and is a bit shorter than my usual posts of late. I don't quite care for how it came out, but I wanted to end the Dilgar War arc here and move on to the endgame for the story. The next chapter will be a filler and will be in the works soon enough.

**Chapter 15 Endings  
**

Following the war with the Dilgar, the Terran Hegemony as a whole had to deal with a wholly new situation: being a guardian. The Dilgar had only a few systems that were their own possession. Omelos was slowly being stripped by the Dilgar, a situation that truly puzzled the League, and those few Dilgar who were found were returned to Mitoc. The HAF Navy remained in operation dealing with a number of smaller fleets of Dilgar ships that had been caught by the death of so many of the Warmasters. Piracy was an issue, rivaling the Drazi in the role as pirates still fighting the war if only to support themselves now than their Imperium.

For the very first time, the Hegemony had to open up their borders to allow a fleet of ships from the League with their representatives to travel to Proxima Centauri for a meeting on _Babylon Station 3_. To prepare for the number of alien ships (far more than the usual diplomatic transports), the station used its powerful engines to move further away from the Jump Gate. Armed patrols were heavily increased in both duration and number and exact emergence zones were situated near the station as well.

The Centauri agreed to send a representative as well for a Tribunal to be held at the governing station for the Hegemony. All of the League races made a case (or tried to submit bribes in the case of the Brakiri) for their appointment to the Tribunal, but all were told that the Tribunal would consist solely of a Terran, Centauri, and Markab representative.

Amid the uproar from the various League nations, there was little from a few of the League nations. The Drazi, Markab, and Yolu nations had not chosen to join the joint-League fleet that had been present at Mitoc. It is ironic that the Yolu only joined the League because of the instigation of the Vree and the spread of Mutai as a result of their renewed ties with other races. The Drazi were "shamed" by their performance against the Dilgar. Stro'kath proved to be the major instigator of moving away from the League for the Drazi. Their lack of performance when faced with the Dilgar and their lack of capability when the Terrans executed their battle plan showed them that the League was on their way out. The Markab had been titular members of the League and were a strong ally of the Hegemony.

The presence of a Markab representative on the Dilgar Tribunal spoke volumes to the League that the League may not be around too much longer. The Hegemony had long rebuffed offers from the League prior to the war with the Dilgar; mostly through their own policy of non-intervention, their response to the Dilgar invasion of the League only came after the Dilgar attack on _Babylon Station 5_. Including the Centauri on the Tribunal was an insult to many within the League, mostly due to the fact that a large contingent of the League was once client states of the Centauri. The Centauri had an excellent rapport with the Hegemony and a result it was no surprise that they had their place on the Tribunal.

All eyes turned to the Hegemony world of Proxima Centauri and to the massive _Babylon Station_ found in that system.

***-EH-***

_**Babylon Station 3  
**_**Proxima Centauri**

Ambassador David Sheridan wondered just why he had been chosen to represent the Hegemony on the Dilgar Tribunal, specifically he wondered if it had something to do with his recent dealings with Bureau 13. His son, John, was still a teenager and yet he was flying a fighter during the Bureau's assault against Omelos. Blistering the butt of the Bureau's primary representative to the Council of Lords made him fairly notorious to that organization. David wondered if that notoriety was being used to show that the Hegemony was not a society that was in close "lock step" with each other. It was funny that the outside world noticed so little of how life really was in the Hegemony. His anger wasn't against the government, but rather against the agency in question for letting a teenager, regardless of his impressive capabilities, go to war when other adults could do the same.

His time in the Diplomatic Corps served him well, though he did wonder if this Tribunal would be the same as dealing with the Centauri when he worked with them to create the Treaty of Vega. He hoped not as there wasn't enough alcohol available on the station to get the League to cooperate in the way he hoped that they would. It could get messy, but thankfully Operation _Chimera_ took out a large number of the Warmasters. Those few who remained of the Dilgar's military were those Warmasters who were part of the Warmaster's Council or were lower ranking officers. For the vast majority of those who were lower ranking they would be given a blanket pardon and then allowed to do their duty in defending their nation (with some assistance from the HAF Navy). The Warmasters would be tricky, but with the presumed death of Jha'dur and the death of her brother Sha'dur the League's greatest foes would not be put on trial.

David grinned ferally when he read a report that stated that Len'char had been found and captured after a brief struggle. The CAAN unit that had found him was up for a Unit Citation; at least they would be when he turned in the particular paperwork for them. Capturing Len'char and trying him was the sole reason why the Hegemony was even willing to host the Tribunal. Getting the League to let them try Len'char solely would be a massive headache and the death of the Supreme Warmaster made Len'char the senior most Warmaster for the Dilgar. The League may want him on their own platter.

Of course, the recent political difficulties that the League was dealing with may keep them from making any coherent response to the Terran plans for Len'char. Politics could easily deal with Len'char, but David knew that Bureau 13 wanted him for their own reasons. David truly wished that they had some dank, dark hole where they could put Len'char where he could see why it wasn't good to wake a sleeping giant.

***-EH-***

**League Meeting Chambers  
Brakos**

"It is intolerable that we have to go the Hegemony for these trials!"

The sentiment was reciprocated by all present at the meeting. In a week's time, the League's ambassadors would have to journey to the Terran Hegemony and to one of their spacestations. It galled them highly that such a young race, at least to their viewpoint, would have such power over them. Even the Terran's intervention in their war against the Dilgar had been done without even a "by your leave" to the League's states. The situation was fast becoming nasty to be within the League. Even though both the Yolu and the Markab were really nominal members of the League, the Drazi were a full member. The fact that all three races had chosen to leave the League behind and were even trying to get closer to the Hegemony was almost intolerable from their point of view. More than a few of the League states that had been continually rebuffed by the Hegemony, notably the Brakiri, were pleased to see that the Hegemony was rejecting all offers to join with them.

"We know that the Terrans will want to try Len'char and that will be our attempted leverage to use against them."

It was no surprise that it was the Brakiri representative who brought up this piece of business.

"We will have to force the Terrans on this point of view if we are to get any kind of settlement from the Dilgar. They are now protected by the Terrans and we cannot do anything against them, especially since they are using the fleet that was hidden from all of us."

The loss of an _Avioki_ to a Terran _Warlock_ (specifically the _Nemesis_) stung the Brakiri mightily and they continued to lash out verbally to the Hegemony for that loss. It was not mentioned by the Brakiri that they had been firing on a Hegemony ground force at the time when the ship was destroyed, though a number of the other League states knew that the Hegemony had been correct when they destroyed the Brakiri warship.

"We must be united in order for the Dilgar to truly receive what they deserve for their actions. We must be united together and not let our own thoughts come ahead of this key desire. All of us together."

This final statement was made to the Abbai's contingent. The Abbai, while they had suffered with the loss of Tirolus to the Dilgar, still believed that the chief reason for the Dilgar's attitude had been for another reason. They still believed that the Hegemony, while not their first choice for a "neutral" world, was still neutral enough to hold the Tribunal. They didn't care for the Centauri, but approved of the Markab's stance in regard to the League.

"The Abbai people do support your endeavor, but we hold deep reservations about your methods to get justice for us all. Do not underestimate the Terrans. They proved to be dangerous warriors when they were attacked by the Dilgar. While many of us here do not like this thought, they **did** defeat the Dilgar without our assistance either. I advise caution to all of you here. I fear that we may be going away sooner rather than later. I don't want this to be our society's last "gasp."

Even though the plea went out to the assembled League Ambassadors, many of them were burning with revenge against the Dilgar. They left their conference with a variety of plans, but no real idea how they would get their way at the Tribunal. Some of the Ambassadors were holding out hope that they would be able to bluff their way in with weaponry to exact some kind of personal revenge against the Dilgar, but knew that it would be futile. Others hoped to force the Hegemony to allow their demands to be met, even if they were presented at the head of a large fleet.

It came down to what would happen on the Terran spacestation.

***-EH-***

**Terran Jump Gate  
L3 Proxima Centauri**

The Terran-manufactured Jump Gate remained at the L3 position in the Proxima Centauri system for over a century once the Hegemony had opened up their space to traders. The Gate remained in this particular position as it was opposite the main habitable planet in the Proxima Centauri system. It was also fairly (in astronomical terms at least) close to Alpha Centauri, where the Hegemony kept one of their larger naval bases. Now the Gate was all alone in the void of space. Where once it had the _Babylon Station_ to keep it company it now sat alone with only interstellar space and a few stray particles of free hydrogen to keep it company.

The _Babylon Station_ had been moved to the L1 point for heightened security. It was thought that having all races approach opposite the star, using the star's own gravitational field as a defense mechanism, would keep many of the League races from attempting to bring in larger than normal fleets. That thought was soon rendered moot when the first ships began to jump into the system. The Centauri's delegation had already arrived as had the Markab and it was only the League who had to show up now.

With a flash of light, the Jump Gate activated and disgorged a motley collection of ships from the League. Stately warships of a multitude of races came through the Gate. They came out in battle formation, but were sorely disappointed that they exited to nothing at all. A small relay satellite transmitted to the League's formation of ships the actual location of the _Babylon Station_. The message went out in Interlac to keep any of the League nations from saying that they "had not received valid instructions." It appeared that the Hegemony was prepared for any and all tricks. A full minute went by without any movement from the League's ships, until the Abbai faction began to move towards the station. They had to use a gravity assist to get to the station and soon enough the rest of the League ships began to move toward the Terran spacestation.

All along the route taken by the League ships the HAF Navy was present to keep the peace. The Brakiri were the worst offender as they continually chose to ignore directions from the fighters sent out to escort their ships in to their parking orbit. It wasn't until a Brakiri _Avioki_ came close to running down one of the _Novas_ sent to escort it did the HAF Navy send in one of their warships to personally escort the ship to the station under their guns. A pair of _Olympus_ Destroyers used a micro jump to come right next to the Brakiri ship; completely surprising them since they were not capable of using such a maneuver. Sufficiently cowed, the Brakiri ship moved back to their travel lane and did not trouble the HAF fleet again.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Tribunal  
**_**Babylon Station 3  
**_**Proxima Centauri**

At long last the scheduled Dilgar Tribunal began with some fanfare. The large amphitheater was created out of the original chamber in the _Babylon Station_ and for many of the participants they were overawed by the appearance of the Tribunal location. The total appearance was calculated to show the might of the HAF Army and the 4th RCT was in full armor with several of their heaviest equipment in plain sight of most of the attendees. The 4th RCT had already pledged to pay back the Brakiri for their actions over Mitoc and the commanders of the various BCTs and CAAN Combat Teams saw that guard duty here at Proxima Centauri was an excellent chance for them to get some measure of revenge.

The fracturing League of Non-Aligned Worlds were more than willing to see justice against the Dilgar, but only wanted it on their own terms. The Hegemony as a whole wanted to see justice against Len'char and didn't care too much about the rest of the Dilgar. It was this clash of ideals that would make the Tribunal unique for all sides. To keep things as impartial as possible, the three member Tribunal Ruling Panel chose to have the Centauri speak for them. Knowing that the majority of the League were once vassal races of the Centauri, the decision was as much a political one as it was a measure of contempt for the League by the Hegemony.

Helmut Madrin was selected as the Centauri representative and was less than inclined to help out the League or the Hegemony. He was only there because his House had fallen on hard times and they needed to "get in good" with the Hegemony for some economic incentives. Houses Mollari and Jaddo had been able to succeed by going into business with the Hegemony on a number of Inside out worlds and House Madrin wanted that advantage as well. It was hoped by his House that a good performance here would give them an opportunity to gain some trade concessions or even an Inside out world of their own.

"Bring in the first prisoner."

A Dilgar Warmaster, Dru'tal, was the first to be brought into the chamber. He was escorted by a heavily armored and armed contingent of HAF Army troopers. The HAF Army was there just as much to prevent the Dilgar from getting away as they were there to prevent the League from trying anything. The sheer sight of so many heavily armored troopers along with a number of Terran armored vehicles near the site of the Tribunal was awe inspiring. The League had only heard about the Terran strike against Mitoc and had not truly believed the reports of their military on that world. The 4th RCT was selected to guard the proceedings as much for their experience and their hatred of the Brakiri from their actions over Mitoc.

The proceedings for Dru'tal were quickly finished and he was sentenced for being a member of the Warmaster's Council who voted to go to war against the League. As the League protested the punishment, he was to be sent to a Terran prison camp, the next prisoner was brought in. A stream of lesser known Warmasters were all given the same punishment of being sent to a prison camp that the Terrans had created in a unique Trinary star system within their borders. The world was inaccessible to everyone but their own ships and the Dilgar would be housed "humanely" there.

Only one Warmaster was spared this particular punishment, Dar'sen, and only because Stro'kath spoke out in favor of his tactics used during the war. The Hegemony proposed sending Dar'sen to Mitoc where he would become the commander of the Dilgar's defensive forces there. Out of all of the Dilgar, his record was flawless, much like Ari'shan's and the judgment was accepted. This all was just the lead-up, however, to the biggest part of the Tribunal. The vast majority of the Dilgar had been following the orders of their Warmasters and had been sentenced to serve as part of their own military once more under Dar'sen and Ari'shan.

After four days of the Tribunal, at long last the trial for Len'char was upon them. He had heard much of what went on and had a number of visitors from the various League representatives. All offered him a chance to live, but under their control. His laughing was heard on the various security tapes and offered the Hegemony's media a number of sound bites that were replayed continually on the various Hegemony news stations. For a long time the League representatives could not figure out that all of their conversations were being caught, even when they used their best means of "defeating" any eavesdropping systems. Len'char seemed to enjoy the meetings though.

He entered the Tribunal space with his head held high. He refused to meet the eyes of any of the other Dilgar prisoners while he was guarded by the soldiers of the 4th RCT. A full squad of six troopers wearing _Raiden_ power armor escorted him to the witness seat in front of the packed courtroom. All six of the troopers, with two of them behind him and the rest facing the courtroom, took up their positions with professional ease. Len'char sat and held himself upright secure in his former position.

He knew that the Hegemony wanted his head on a pike, but he wasn't about to give them the satisfaction of seeing him squirm like a schoolboy caught in a lie. He knew that Kas'vaka had a plan and would free him, even though the Drakh had not been seen in quite some time. The Drakh were tricky like that. Soon enough he would be free and he would be Emperor of the Dilgar, not like the weakling who was currently on the throne. The Dilgar would be a great nation under his rule. "Emperor Len'char" had a nice ring to it.

Those thoughts filled his head as the Tribunal panel deliberated about his ultimate fate. The League, especially the Brakiri, was trying to gain custody of Len'char to keep him away from the Terrans. No other Dilgar brought out such animosity in the hearts and minds of the League and the Hegemony. Most of the League did not care, but all of them were angry that the Hegemony had only fought such limited engagements against the Dilgar. Not every world had been freed and many still had a sizable quantity of Dilgar troops on them who still had to be expelled or sent back to Mitoc. These states, specifically the Cascor, Ipsha, and Balosians, all were at the Tribunal to gain assistance in driving out the Dilgar.

It was all overshadowed by the trial of Len'char.

***-EH-***

**Drakh Forward Base  
Location unknown**

Kas'vaka looked out over the spartan structure that stood before him. The base had not been intended for long term operation, but given the circumstances, anything was preferable to the burned out remains of their previous base. Thinking back, he knew that an assault on Omelos was inevitable, he was just surprised how quickly their base had been found and then eliminated.

"Make ready to move the base. Raze what is left once we do move from this base."

"Why must be do these things?" The flunky thought that Kas'vaka had lost his mind in moving this particular base. Much like how the Hegemony built their bases, so too had this base been built in an uninhabited system. Their physiology didn't need much at all to survive upon, so much like their own masters or their long-time foe.

"Are you frightened Kas'vaka like before? Should I take over for you or are you afraid that the Centauri or the Orieni will come and tear down our world all over again? Would you prefer to have our masters come and fix this problem that you've created? It is time for new leadership and you've been around for too long…"

That quip was all that was needed to break the proverbial back for Kas'vaka. He rushed forward and back handed the lesser Drakh before him. Pouncing on the smaller member of his race with a snarl of frustration, Kas'vaka began to beat the other member of his species. Their ability to survive for longer periods of time prevented him from doing too much damage. The bruises would fade, but the pain would be reminder of the underling's place under his heel. The loss of their homeworld caused the Drakh as a whole to have a law that forbade the killing of any of their kind.

Kas'vaka looked out to the others, none of which were willing to meet his eyes, and looked with derision at them.

"If there's anyone else here who thinks that my leadership is suspect, let them speak or else keep quiet. Continue with your duties. We are going soon enough."

His minions began to follow his orders. Kas'vaka thought about his other minion, Len'char, it was a shame that he had to be left to the "mercies" of the League or worse still the Hegemony, but that was always a possibility in their line of work. There would be other races out there that the Drakh could influence. Those touched by his masters were more susceptible than any others; perhaps the Centauri, what an irony that they would be the downfall of the Terrans.

***-EH-***

**Dilgar Tribunal  
**_**Babylon Station 3  
**_**Proxima Centauri**

It all came back to Len'char, he knew that it be so, except in his eyes he would have been crowned as Emperor Len'char. That had a nice ring to it and that thought stayed with him as the Terran soldiers surrounded him with their armor suits. He knew that the armor was stronger than anything the Dilgar had or even the League or even the Centauri. That explained why the fight on Mitoc had ended so quickly in favor of the Terrans.

His thoughts went back to when he was captured by the Terrans. He had been coming back from the hidden shipyard that he had put in place with the Drakh. How he truly loathed the Drakh now! They had left him behind and gone off somewhere he could not find them at all. The expectation had been for the Drakh to support his claim to the throne, but that now was gone for him. He had resigned himself to a lifetime of prison or even death; it depended entirely upon who got custody of him following this Tribunal. Either way, he would have to deal with the consequences of his actions.

Len'char watched the spectacle before him as it continued on and on for hours on end. After the fifth hour of rhetoric from the Brakiri representative, he had enough of the situation.

"Enough! Do I have any say in where I will go or do you intend to force that on me?"

Loud murmuring was heard throughout the audience chamber. Len'char knew that his statements had stirred the crowd. It was already known that the Brakiri were out for blood not because of what had been done to them, but rather to spite the Terrans. The Abbai had shown that they were following their usual pacifistic tendencies, but it was not enough to sway the Brakiri from their stance. For what seemed to be the millionth time, Len'char wondered why Jha'dur had not destroyed them all in her early campaigns. Perhaps it was her folly, but since she was last seen at Tiree and her fleet destroyed, Len'char assumed that she was no more due to the actions of the Terrans.

The frenzied words moved back and forth and a number of gestures were seen. The soldiers around him suddenly closed ranks as the crowd began to surge forward. With a crack of displaced air, several bolts of weapons fire came out of the crowd towards Len'char's position. Screams in a menagerie of tongues were spoken while the weapons fire lashed towards him. He was surprised and a bit pleased when one of the Terran soldiers took one of the bolts of weapons fire meant for him. The surprise was increased when several hidden figures were revealed in the audience. They appeared to be Terrans, but they had weapons sprouting out of their arms. The thought was terrifying for Len'char that "normal" Terrans could have weapons like what their power armor carried, but in a smaller package. A variety of blades, claws, and a myriad of barrels were seen as the operatives turned to face those firing from the audience.

Terror was seen in the faces of many within the crowd, especially those who were seated next to the Terran operatives as they began to fight with the figures that had fired upon Len'char. They had heard of the technology used by the Hegemony, but seeing it used was far stronger than just hearing about it. The ones who fired upon Len'char were screaming in a language he had never heard, but it sounded like something the Drakh would speak in, but he wasn't certain of that fact. He had only heard them speak in his own language, how it was managed Len'char didn't know, but he knew that the Drakh were ancient. Those screaming individuals were hauled away by the force of arms, but they soon were shown to be Brakiri instead of Drakh as Len'char had thought previously. The facial tattoos were what gave away the attackers once they were captured by the Terran forces.

The chamber remained in complete pandemonium. It wasn't until another squad of power armored soldiers of the 4th RCT supported by a large antigravity _Warhawk_ appeared, did the audience start to notice that they were fully surrounded by Terran soldiers and equipment. Slowly the audience began to quiet down as numerous Terran soldiers and even heavier equipment began to fill the space where the Tribunal was located. The appearance of several of the fearsome _Odin_ Infantry Tanks caused the last of those who were "gate crashers" to relent and cease struggling. All present knew that the ire of the Terrans was high at this point and any other dissenters would be shot for being complicit with the attackers.

Slowly the Tribunal was brought back to a semblance of order. Two more squads of power armor troops in their _Raiden_ armor joined up with their fellows in the Tribunal's amphitheater space. Additional tanks were brought in and antigravity craft were moving over the assembly continually. The operatives in the audience brought out the potential saboteurs and put them into a makeshift stockade until they could be processed and be sent to trial. Helmut Madrin stood up and made a statement before the Tribunal:

"If all this mess is finished with, perhaps we can continue with these proceedings."

With a series of nods from the Markab and Terran judges and with the quieting down of the audience, the Tribunal continued with Len'char once more in the witness chair. A series of witnesses came forward to render testimony about the accused position and decisions made during the war. After close to three additional hours of testimony from the League did Governor General Samuel Ishida take the position of the chief witness for the Hegemony. His Interrogator was Brocat, the Brakiri's Ambassador to the League during the start of the Dilgar's attack on the League of Non Aligned Worlds.

"You are the commander for the Terran battlestation known as _Babylon Station 3_, is that correct?"

"It is most certainly not a battlestation, but I am the Governor General of the Station. I was present when a large Dilgar fleet chose to attack our station even though the Hegemony was not involved in attacking any Dilgar force, aside from defensive actions."

The last part was added once the Governor General worked out the tactic of the questioner. The incident with the _Persephone_ had become well known throughout the League and could be used to imply that the Hegemony was already guilty of attacking the Dilgar. It was a possible tactic, but the simple truth of the situation was that the Dilgar had over reached too much with that attack on a Terran ship and they paid for their presumption.

"Regardless of what you consider your station to be Governor General, the end result was that the Dilgar considered it to be a military target and chose to attack it."

"By your own admission Ambassador it could be inferred that the creation of the _Corumai_ could be considered the same situation and yet our station was able to defend itself from an overwhelming Dilgar fleet." It was pure snark on the part of the Governor General, but the sentiment was true and well known to everyone in the audience chamber. Even though most of the 4th RCT's soldiers were in sealed armor, it was obvious that most of them were laughing at the Brakiri Interrogator.

"That is neither here nor there," but the majority of the audience knew that the slight had hit home on the Brakiri Ambassador. "Let us continue with the questioning."

"Indeed Ambassador, the Hegemony has a question for you as well: what plans have the Brakiri put in place to acquire Len'char? What do you plan on doing, aside from interrupting this meeting with your saboteurs, if you do not get your way? Will you panic and lash out like a child does when they don't get their way?"

The pale face of Ambassador Brocat gave a silent assent to the words of the Terran Governor General. All present could see the war within as Brocat tried to find a lie to the words spoken to him, but couldn't find the appropriate lies to speak. The distinctive facial tattoos showed that the perpetrators were of his species and that could not be faked (or at least easily faked by other races). He slowly bowed his head in acknowledgement of his lack of words to be spoken.

A brief discussion broke among the Tribunal Councilors as this information was shared to them. They had seen first-hand the willingness of the Brakiri to see their own goals met, even by force of arms. The preliminary reports from the 4th RCT's soldiers were that those who had interrupted the Tribunal had all been members of the various criminal groups or _Chadis_ groups, though they lacked the usual number of facial tattoos of full-fledged members, though several had a close enough approximation of them. The weapons used were the same gravitic type as carried by Brakiri soldiers. Fortunately for the 4th RCT's power armored troops, their armor was stronger than the hand weaponry and none of the troopers had been injured by them.

A steady stream of testimony from all involved along with the surprising revelation that the Omelos sun was set to go nova caused widespread murmuring from the crowd. The actual answer for the question on everyone's minds, "What reason did the Dilgar have for prosecuting their war?" was actually answered at last. The long testimonies had slowly revealed this fact to the citizens of the galaxy. Some pity remained, especially in the case of the Abbai nation, but few others were willing to give the Dilgar that emotion after the suffering that they had to endure.

Finally the Tribunal came to an agreement for the last of the Dilgar to be tried before them. Helmut Madrin, as the duly elected leader of the Tribunal, stood up and gave the final report of the Tribunal.

"It is with a heavy heart that I render the final judgment on the Dilgar people. They will be left with the former world of Mitoc as their own world for the rest of time. Their former empire will be reduced and only Mitoc will remain. Omelos with their sun about to go nova will be evacuated and all surviving Dilgar will be left upon the surface of Mitoc. The Terran Hegemony has gladly offered to garrison the system and has already announced the formation of one of their Ring Worlds around Mitoc to aid in the defense of the Dilgar nation. Those Warmasters who have been found guilty of war crimes will be sentenced to a prison that will be run by the Terran Hegemony in a system within their territory. Any further issues are not part of the purview of this Tribunal. So says the Tribunal. With that, I call this meeting adjourned."

A sharp double rap of a gavel was heard and the Tribunal rose to their feet and exited out of the room as the crowd nearly went out of control. Only the 4th RCT's troopers prevented this from happening again.

***-EH-***

As news reports began to filter away from _Babylon Station 3_, the general consensus was that the war was finally over. For others, they remained occupied by the Dilgar and even though Mitoc would be the only world that the Dilgar could "legally" own, their soldiers remained on several League worlds. These holdouts were given the chance to quietly join their brethren on Mitoc, but as with all races there would be some who chose to continue the "good" fight. The market for mercenaries became even more lucrative for many of those races who chose to join in it. A large number of what were termed as "low-intensity conflicts" erupted across the galaxy as the Dilgar's remnants were engaged along with a myriad of pirates operating out of the shattered League of Non-Aligned Worlds.

The war time devastation of the League proved to be fertile ground for corporations across the galaxy, but oddly enough, the Hegemony remained quiet. A number of League nations could have benefited from patronage from the Hegemony's numerous corporations, but none chose to expend any effort on the League. It was almost as if the Hegemony had already written off the League, a sentiment that many other nations had begun to realize as well. The Centauri had, at first, picked up a number of contracts across League space for the eventual rebuilding to come about. Slowly, those same corporations began to move away from the League contracts. The same reason for why the Hegemony chose not to bid on the rebuilding soon became known to the Centauri as well: the League wasn't worth their efforts.

Their lack of cohesion against the Dilgar simply doomed the League to destruction in the minds of many in both the Hegemony's and the Centauri's main corporations. Even though they could have made large sums of money, the situation at the time was tenuous and trade between both nations was of better value. The League would be left out to wither since they had not learned anything, even after being told the old Terran phrase: "Hang together or hang separately." They chose to hang separately and the actions of the Brakiri had left many in the Hegemony looking to sever those few business dealings that they had with the League.

The lack of response from the League nations to even censor the Brakiri showed that the League was doomed. Someone else might be able to resolve the situation, but the Hegemony would stay away from them. The race (or races) that might choose to support the League would be in for a shock as the proposed markets never truly materialized. The worlds were heavily scarred because of the Dilgar's use of Total War and they would take a far larger amount of monies to bring the damaged biospheres back to their original baseline. Sadly, many of the worlds would never return to their previous glory. Several races were nearly destroyed entirely by the actions of the Dilgar, those few pitiful remnants had no home to return to and the League as a whole could not support them either. Some Hegemony programs were developed to help them out, but far too many of those species did not have the required genetic material to keep inbreeding at bay.

All told, the chaos factor in the galaxy was at the highest point. Numerous factions began to take hold and ancient intelligences began to move once more…


	17. The Beginning of the End

**AN1:** The ship in use by the Orieni Empire can be found in the Wars of the Centauri Republic (for the original version) and the later The Great Crusade (for the current stats), both books made for the Babylon 5 Wars tabletop game. The Rogolon Dynasty and Usuuth Coalition ships are from the book Showdowns 8, also from the Babylon 5 Wars game. Both nations have had their ships upgraded per the fluff text from The Great Crusade.

**Chapter 16 The Beginning of the End**

_**Babylon Station 3**_** Defense Perimeter  
Proxima Centauri**

Following the Tribunal held at _Babylon Station 3_, the inevitable end soon came to pass. Prisoners, all of them former Warmasters of the Dilgar Imperium, were taken away from the Terran spacestation to their new home. Elements of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, most notably the Brakiri, were angry with the terms of the Tribunal. The fact that the majority of the Dilgar had been sentenced to serve out their punishment as protectors for their people was deemed a travesty by many within the League, though the Abbai did consider it a just punishment. For those Warmasters and collaborators who were deemed to be at fault in causing the war against the League and for those few atrocities committed, they were sentenced to a Terran world that could only be accessed using the Hegemony's more advanced jump drives.

Each of the prisoners was slowly loaded into the sole transport for their journey to the Hegemony's prison system. As the system was actually under the jurisdiction of Bureau 13, it had started off as a science station researching the unique trinary system; the prisoners were loaded onto a _Warlock_ for the journey. Given the fearsome reputation of the _Warlocks_, specifically the _THS Nemesis_ at Sorith and later at Mitoc, the decision to use such a ship for the transfer was well appreciated by many within the Hegemony. They knew that any attackers would have a hard time dealing with the powerful warship. To make things "difficult" for any would-be attackers, the _Warlock_ would be fully escorted by several Bureau 13 ships that were progressing as part of a supply convoy to the science station.

After each of the Dilgar were loaded onto the _Warlock_, the _THS Sorceress_, the ship took a scant few moments before assembling the small fleet of ships together for their journey to Aldebaran (as the trinary system has become known). As they were about to leave Proxima Centauri, a large fleet of ships chose to come out of hyperspace near to where the spacestation had been at the L1 point. A mish-mash of ship types, all from the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, appeared where the _Babylon Station_ had previously been. It was in the process of being moved back to the L3 point where the Terran built Jump Gate resided when the League fleet jumped into the Proxima system.

Without accurate sensors, the League fleet of ships did not know that the _Babylon Station_ had been moved at all. Using their previous scans of the area where the Terran spacestation had sat, they attempted to build up enough data to allow for a rapid assault on the Dilgar Prisoners of War prior to them being shipped deeper into the Hegemony's space. Instead of finding the Terran spacestation, they instead found only (nearly) empty space. Aside from some stray Hydrogen, they found little else. Confused as to why this happened, forgetting that the _Babylon Station_ design made it mobile (albeit rather "slowly" when compared to typical Terran ships), they attempted to locate the spacestation.

All the while, the _Sorceress_ and the attendant Bureau resupply ships were forming up before they began their jump into hyperspace. Unbeknownst to the League fleet, they had indeed been spotted by the Terrans, but since they were searching the wrong location nothing was said to them. By the time the League ships even found out their mistake, the _Babylon Station_ had its full weapons suite available and a full fleet from the HAF Navy was enroute from their duty station at Alpha Centauri. Left with little choice, the League fleet jumped back into hyperspace without completing their self-appointed task.

They left with much cursing, but the argument quickly degenerated into a case of "pointing fingers" at each other as the League fleet broke apart. Each League race left for their own space vowing either for revenge against the Hegemony or to "never" work with anyone else from the League ever again. Slowly the lines of fracturing were growing ever larger in the League of Non-Aligned Worlds. What had once started out as a treaty organization for mutual defense and trade was slowly being torn apart as the component races began to drift apart once more as the cracks in their original agreement began to fracture. Little did anyone know that the collapse of the League would herald other changes in the galaxy.

***-EH-***

**Omelos  
Former Dilgar Imperium  
2235  
**

It was a solemn collection of ships that appeared within the outer boundaries of the Omelos system. The lead ship in the small flotilla was the _THS Nemesis_, a massive Terran Hegemony _Warlock_ class ship. Along with the HAF Navy ship was a collection of ships from races who were allied with the Hegemony; a Centauri, Markab, Free Dilgar, and an Abbai warship were part of the ad-hoc fleet. These ships had all come to witness the end of Omelos as the star went nova. The system had long been empty of any traffic as the world of Omelos had been stripped by the Free Dilgar Empire as part of their reparations following the end of their war with the League of Non Aligned Worlds. Their former capital world looked little like what it once had been; whatever splendor had long been removed from it.

It began slowly as the star began to use up the Hydrogen that was the principle fuel for the fusion process. Ships slowly left as they could no longer bear witness, until finally the _Nemesis_ was the last to leave the system. All of the ship captains knew that to go into hyperspace would be potentially fatal, unless the ship possessed shielding techniques. As the Centauri, Markab and Free Dilgar ships lacked this protection capability (aside from the weak shielding from their gravitic drive systems), they instead sped as quickly as their engines could bring them past the system's Kuiper Belt. Both the Abbai ship and the Terran ship were shielded and were the last to leave the system.

Onboard the _Nemesis_, the main viewing area was filled with a variety of dignitaries and an assortment of ambassadors (most of them had shuttled over prior to the nova's beginning). All watched with some sense of sick amusement at the pretty colors as the star in the Omelos system went nova. The shielded ship that they were on had been specially fitted with a larger number of advanced sensor packages and was fitted with additional gravitic dissipaters for the protection of the crew and passengers. The modular nature of the Terran ship made it ideal for the situation.

Those on the ship were taking time to enjoy the atmosphere in the lounge. They were wining and dining away trying to form alliances in the wake of the Hegemony's decision to not rebuild the League. Even when the Centauri allowed several Houses to bid for contracts in the League, these same Houses quickly started to abandon their projects. They had come to the same conclusion as the Hegemony; the League wasn't worth saving in their minds. Those ambassadors who were allowed to accompany the Hegemony's premiere ship saw another chance to plead their case to other diplomats. Missing from those who were present in the ship's lounge were those civilians who could have assisted the League: entrepreneurs, businessmen, and the idle rich. The simple fact that the ship was a registered warship of the HAF Navy kept them from being onboard.

The League was in for a rude shock. They had planned on meeting those who could assist them and instead they received half promises and platitudes. Some of the League's representatives persisted, but very little came of those talks. Those few worlds that had once been occupied by the Dilgar had all been freed previously, but too many of them still needed assistance. That same assistance was lacking as the Hegemony as a whole had chosen not to assist (aside from some humanitarian aid from religious groups) the League. The Centauri, Markab, Yolu, and Drazi had all chosen not to aid the League either and with three previous members of the League turning away from the organization, it was widely expected that the League would collapse soon enough. It was a situation that was hoped for in many quarters and rejected in others.

The attempt by the League to take justice into their own hands had backfired spectacularly. The "proof" as spoken by the Hegemony's diplomats was shown to everyone and the complicity of several of those sent by the League was seen by all. As with some of their actions following the Tribunal had cast another series of nails into the coffin of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds.

***-EH-***

**Excerpts from **_**Atlas of the Terran Hegemony 2268 Edition**_** Barnard's Star Press 2268**

_**Prologue**_

_The worlds of the Terran Hegemony remain some of the strangest of those in known space. Not even the enigmatic Tal-Kona'Sha can claim such a distinction and that particular species is rumored to be no more and guarded by sentient ships left behind. Having a few systems that have been publicly released to the outside galaxy, those worlds that have a _Babylon Station_ nearby, the vast majority of the holdings of the Terran Hegemony are unknown to the outside world. These worlds started off unknown due to the revelation of possible hostile aliens in the early 21__st__ Century when the Terran people began their exploration of hyperspace and other stars near to their homeworld. It wasn't until contact was made with the distinctly hostile Ch'Lonas and Koulani did the Terran people come to experience war once more. Even the war with the Centauri was a result of worlds that had previously occupied by the Centauri, but later abandoned._

_It is easy to note that particular worlds are able to be found thanks to maps left behind by the Centauri Republic (all of which can be easily purchased from them for a nominal fee), but the vast number of former Centauri colonies remain just that: former. These worlds were abandoned due to the societal changes in the Centauri nation at that time. Unrest was common and many of the abandoned worlds had depleted natural resources. The early Explorer Command only settled on some of these worlds because of monetary concerns and what has been termed as "sheer laziness" by some historians. These worlds became a point of contention between the Terran Hegemony and the Centauri Republic at first, but later due to the Treaty of Vega, the region of space "between" the Centauri Republic and the forming League of Non-Aligned Worlds became Terran territory._

_Even with the discovery of the Narn race on their aptly named Homeworld, the expanse of space gained from the Centauri Republic has remained relatively untouched. A large number of stars exist within this region of space and only a small fraction of them were able to be explored by the Centauri. This was mostly due to the placement of Jump Gates in these systems by the Vorlons, but for some reason the Vorlons did not manage to place Jump Gates into all the systems. Whether this was from laziness or some other reason, something that is endlessly debated in the Hegemony, those systems that did not have a Jump Gate were completely unoccupied by anyone. Tapping into this wealth of systems allowed the Terran Hegemony to expand quickly following the signing of the Treaty of Vega. The formation of the Ring Worlds complexes also aided the expansion of the Hegemony beyond their early systems. Inside out worlds also contributed to this expansion._

_Within this volume a number of "conventional" worlds are featured, including the locations of each of the declassified _Babylon Stations_. Other worlds appear as well with an emphasis on those systems that have widely known Inside out worlds, most notably the Vega system. There are also several joint Inside out worlds that were created with assistance from the Centauri Royal Houses of Mollari and Jaddo. Much like some of the worlds that were created that mimic certain climates in the Hegemony, these joint ventures are a good example of the Terran art of creating such a world in addition to their "tourist" value. There also is a section that discusses several worlds that have become declassified; much like the Dilgar Prison world Aldebaran, Sigma 957, and Ch'Lon._

_-I-_

_**Sigma 957**_

_For countless generations of space traveling members of the Centauri Royal Navy, House Navy, and Merchant Fleets the system known only as Sigma 957 had remained an area of space that was quarantined. Numerous ships had been lost as they tried to claim the sole habitable planet in the system and numerous reports of "ghost" ships continued to be uttered quietly at numerous ports of call throughout Centauri space. It was long thought that the Terrans "were more than welcome to the world" when it was included as part of the space that was accorded to them by the Treaty of Vega. No more was ever said once the system was first mapped by the Hegemony. Many within the various nations assumed, incorrectly, that the Terrans had decided to leave the system alone due to the stories told about it. They assumed wrong._

_With a great deal of foreknowledge from the Kirishiac Remnant, Bureau 13 began a systematic series of explorations of the enigmatic world. Long regarded as a repository for their knowledge, the Walkers had spent vast amounts of time exploring time and space. With one of their repository worlds falling into the sphere of influence of the Hegemony, Bureau 13 was able to lead several expeditions to open up this world for further exploration. Unfortunately for them, their hubris led the first few expeditions to fail as the defenses left behind by the Walkers was enough to defeat them._

_Eventually, after much trial and error, Bureau 13 was able to crack the first series of traps and defenses that the Walkers placed on their only repository on the current plane of existence. It was later learned that the Walkers had two other worlds that were kept in other dimensional spaces that were unfortunately not listed in the current repository. The information gained by Bureau 13 was enough that they were able to outfit their forces adequately for the war against the Dilgar._

_Much of what was found on the Walker repository world was copied over to several large knowledge mediums. These mediums were transferred directly to the HRAD facility at Epsilon Eridani 3 (otherwise known as The Great Machine) where the technicians are still working to decipher much of the information included in them. Following the Bureau's operations to recover as much of the repository, Sigma 357 was "officially" abandoned to keep the Walkers from being aware of any changes. Given the nature of the Walkers and their abilities to traverse both space and time, it very likely is possible that they are already aware of the intrusions, but do not care enough (as it is hoped by many in Bureau 13)._

_-I-_

_**Aldeberan**_

_The unique system known as Aldeberan to the Terran Hegemony is actually a known system to the Centauri Republic. Once known as Beta 11, the world that became Aldeberan was abandoned following the Centauri's war with the Orieni during the first part of the 21__st__ Century. One of several unique worlds that were colonized by Bureau 13 during the time period known as the Golden Century, Aldeberan was intended to be part of a larger series of worlds to be occupied by Bureau 13 as the Ch'Lon system was starting to become filled with experiments and the assorted detritus from close to a century of unchecked scientific experimentation. The other redeeming feature of having this location in space occupied was that it was abandoned by the Centauri and yet would be close enough to an allied race if problems should happen._

_The esoteric method used by the Hegemony to access star systems that would normally not be passable (except by a First One race) allowed Bureau 13 to build a series of what they've called HRAD RRR Worlds. These Repair Refit and Research Worlds were developed to allow for continuing research to continue into different ship designs and for any of the Bureau's fleet to be repaired and refitted if the need was there for that action. Partially based off the HAF Navy Fleet Bases, the HRAD RRR Worlds functioned as "think tanks" for scientific endeavors in addition to their functionality as a repair yard. The nearby Beta 10 system and Quadrant 3 were later absorbed into the first tri-RRR World complex._

_The only ships that were able to travel to these systems were those ships that made use of the Bureau's Phase Shift jumpdrive and the Kirishiac ELINT sensors. Hyperspace in this region of space was littered with a number of hyperspatial anomalies and other difficult regions to traverse using the "traditional" jump engines (much like those used by the Centauri and the League of Non-Aligned Worlds). It was never determined what caused all of these anomalies, but given the relative nearness of the Vorlon's enclave it could be posited that they were at fault for this region of space's deterioration. With both the Centauri Republic and the Orieni Imperium making use of holocaustic weaponry during their war at the start of the 21__st__ Century could also be why this region of space remained so denuded of life._

_It was because of this apparent vacuum that Bureau 13 began to explore this region of space. Very little of it was fully mapped out and very little of it has ever been shown on any of the "official" maps of space. The Centauri have preferred to forget about this area of space because of the widespread destruction following their wars against the Orieni and the region itself was of little use (much like the territory ceded to the Hegemony due to the Treaty of Vega) to them other than as a memory of times long past. This region was ripe for exploration, especially with the jump drives used by the Bureau. Several long term projects were initiated, later declassification has showed the development of several new Ring World complexes, and bases were put into production._

_The remoteness of this region of space was ideal for a number of ship building complexes, in addition to the RRR World complexes. A number of the ships that were built to the latest standard for the HAF Navy were completed at these shipyards for use against the Dilgar. Continued development of this region of space continued throughout the Golden Century and during the Dilgar War. It was only after the war was over and the problem of what to do with those captured Warmasters and other criminals was the region changed once more. The remoteness of Aldeberan made it ideal to house a prison complex. While the public was told that a human-compatible planet was found here, it actually is a world that was created by the Bureau as a test bed for a new process of terraforming._

_Instead of building the planet as an Inside out world, which the system does include, the world was heavily terraformed. The entirety of the planet was created as a facsimile of an idealized Terra. This idealized world was intended to be used for experimentation for other attempts to create worlds much like it in other systems. The irony is that the Inside out world system that had provided so many worlds across the human sphere could possibly be supplanted by a terraforming system that was not considered to be important enough when humanity began spreading out from their homeworld._

_The surface of Aldeberan is geologically stable, that is that there are no earthquakes or tremors, with very few mountainous regions on the world. Sixty percent of the world is covered by water, but is separated into a series of fresh water lakes rather than in large salty oceans (though two exist on the world, but remain unconnected). The remaining land masses consist of several large archipelago island chains in the fresh water lakes that are found around the equator with three continents separated by the salty oceans. The sole large equatorial continent is where the fresh water is located with the archipelago chains seeded. The other two continents are separated by the three oceans (one of which is land locked at the southern polar region) giving the world a unique shape. Polar ice is limited with one of the continents found near the northern pole and the southern pole area has minimal ice coverage. The larger southern land mass was selected as the main continent where the Dilgar would be settled._

_Just enough equipment was sent to allow the Dilgar prisoners to form a moderate agrarian society. No technology was given to them aside from some local beasts of burden. Given that the fauna on the world were all moved to this world from around the Hegemony, they were carefully selected with no aggressive species on the world. Since there were no dangerous predators, no weaponry was given to the Dilgar. They had the crude implements to form their own communities with fields, but nothing else was included for them. They would have to grow their own food if they wanted to eat. The Hegemony did outfit several of the archipelago chains with research stations and these same stations were later converted for covert and overt surveillance of the Dilgar prisoners._

***-EH-***

**Excerpt from **_**Intelligence Operations in the League of Non-Aligned Worlds and Their Consequences**_**, New Avalon Press 2287**

_Following the Dilgar War and the Dilgar Tribunal held in the Terran Hegemony, a number of operations were instituted against various powers in the League of Non-Aligned Worlds. It comes as no surprise that the Brakiri were one of those powers who was targeted by the Terran Hegemony in a war that came to be known as a prelude for the later Shadow War. A number of smaller nations were specifically targeted either to cause the Brakiri to see the attacks as a provocation or to "push" them into a specific combat situation. All told numerous operations were carried out by both the principal agency in the Hegemony for intelligence operations, the Intelligence Directorate, and Bureau 13's Counterintelligence Division._

_Both agencies had been formed following the end of the Dilgar War. The Intelligence Directorate had been formed from several agencies, including several civilian and military ones, and had as their main objective to deal with foreign intelligence operations. Bureau 13's division had already been existence for as long as the Bureau had existed. Rather than dealing with conflicting demands on their time, both agencies chose to look beyond any attempts at sabotaging each other's efforts by pooling resources. At first this attitude was more to do with hatred against the Brakiri and their efforts to insert agents during the recent Tribunal for the Dilgar Prisoners of War._

_Conflict with the Brakiri was a mixture of overt combat operations and discrete Machiavellian schemes. Both Terran agencies were known to use both types of operations, but Bureau 13 became best known for their covert operations using operatives augmented with a large manner of hidden weaponry and other devices for espionage purposes. Much like those troopers who were augmented and hidden during the Dilgar Tribunal, these Bureau 13 operatives were able to remain hidden until their weaponry and equipment were needed, much to the detriment of their foes. More than one operative went from a strikingly beautiful figure into a veritable killer in the blink of an eye. _

_Working on a number of worlds within the League, the vast majority of the operatives in Bureau 13 appeared as humans, but some were augmented with nanoware that allowed them to take the form of the League races. These operatives were able to sow a vast amount of terror as even those who might look like a friend instead could have been a Terran operative sent for acts of terrorism (at least in the eyes of the remaining League nations). The vast majority of operatives used their nanoware to mimic the Brakiri, but other races were possible and simply required a fine tuning of their nanoware._

_The Intelligence Directorate made use of a variety of intelligence sources instead of acting as _agent provocateurs_ against the League and other races in the galaxy. Using the advanced Kirishiac sensors, the ELINT gear was used heavily to "spy" upon the Centauri and the Minbari. The Minbari were chosen as they were a known thrall race of the Vorlons. Given the Vorlon's seeming obsession with the Terran race it came as no surprise that further intelligence of any thrall race was essential to Terran security. Both races did not know of the surveillance as the ELINT platforms were heavily shielded and possessed First One level technology much like the _Shadow Hunters_ deployed by Bureau 13 for the past century. The advanced equipment went along with agents who were posted at several embassies that had sprung up following the Dilgar Tribunal and were staffed by and large by the Intelligence Directorate with a few guards from the HAF Army._

***-EH-***

**Intercepted Brakiri Communication, April 2238**

"_Are we secure?"_

"_Yes, we have checked the circuit out multiple times Ambassador. You are as secure as you can be…"_

_[Shuffling is heard from the broadcast, later interpretation shows that it likely is unbound sheets of paper]_

"_Good, we have much to discuss… How do I address you?"_

"_You may call me Mister Brocat."_

"_Is that so?"_

"_That is so Ambassador."_

"_I have so much that I want to know from you and so much more that my people want as well."_

"_That is true Ambassador, but I do have a question for you."_

"_Yes, what is your question?"_

"_What do you want?"_

"_That's it Mister Brocat?"_

_[Silence is heard for a few moments]_

"_What I want is to destroy the Terrans completely. They have been a sore spot for many years against us. They have been condescending to a fault against us."_

"_Is that all Ambassador?"_

"_No, it is not Mister Brocat. I also want aid to help us recover from what the Dilgar did to us. We have been abandoned by every other race. The League is nothing more than a political entity and little else. We have been forgotten and left to stew."_

"_My associates will be able to assist you with this last request easily enough Ambassador and the first request that you have intrigues them as well."_

_[Silence is heard for a few more moments]_

"_What needs to be done Mister Brocat?"_

"_It has already begun Ambassador, it has already begun."_

***-EH-***

**Bureau 13 Intelligence Assessment June 2239**

**To:** Bureau Intelligence Office  
**From:** -name redacted- Agent Mata Hari

**Subject:** LONAW rebuilding

It has been shown to be disconcerting when dealing with the League of Non-Aligned Worlds of late. They are receiving aid from an outside source, with the Brakiri receiving the lion's share. Brocat, their so called Interrogator at the Dilgar Tribunal is working for another species. More than likely this species is on or near a First One level or he's working for another thrall race much like the Dilgar. There is a distinct possibility that the race assisting them is the Drakh or another species. Some intercepted communications have shown destinations that are known Drakh worlds.

On another note, it has been seen by several sensors throughout Hegemony space that has shown the movement of a number of powerful ships of a First One origin. Which First one race is unknown since they were traveling in one of the "higher" energy planes in hyperspace. There is some speculation that it could be the masters of the Drakh and other minded races or organizations like the Technomages. That information remains unknown at this time. We do know that the Vorlons do have us under constant surveillance and the movement could be their own thrall race the Minbari, but it is unknown at this time if it is them. Additional sensor satellites and stations have been activated and are tracking the movement of these ships. The lack of known maps or locations of Hegemony worlds are working in our advantage as only those worlds that had a Vorlon Jump Gate have been visited by these ships.

There is a warning for further operatives; there are some stealthed First Ones in the LONAW. Several operatives have noticed anomalies in recent surveillance operations that could be caused by plane shifted or simply stealthed species. It bears watching for further operations. It is unknown if some of the other First Ones, like the Torvalus are taking a closer look at our operations or if another race is doing the same thing. It goes without saying that all operatives should be on the outlook for these "observers."

**End Report**

***-EH-***

**Excerpt from**_** In the Company of Angels of Death**__, _**by John J. Sheridan, New Avalon Press 2281**

_Chapter 6 The Unexpected Coursing of the _Flame of Purity

_It was strange after dealing with the Dilgar for those few weeks of conflict starting out over Omelos and then at Mitoc we had so little to do following the Tribunal. I had a chance to meet the Dilgar Ace of Aces, Ari'shan and he was unique to say the least about him. Not much else was done aside from going to see my family. It was nice seeing my parents and family, but combat changed how I truly thought about seeing them. It made me think that perhaps the nanoware had changed my perceptions, but then I realized that I had changed, just not in any way that I could have realized. I had to kill Dilgar while in combat, that had changed my thoughts and perceptions of the universe around me. I thought long and hard about what to do with my life and chose to remain with the Bureau's space forces. _

_While I certainly did like being a pilot, I wanted something a bit more for my life and I still wanted to stick around in the Bureau's Fleet rather than switching over to the HAF Navy. I transferred out of the 41__st__ Fighter Wing and went to a sort of "finishing" school for officers. Originally based on Terra, the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst was moved off Terra just before the Dilgar conflict. Getting an appointment there was political as much as from my skills earned on the battlefield (I do think that the commandant for the Academy was an old friend of my father and probably owed him an unspecified, but probably large amount of money from a poker game). There was a bunch to know and here I was still a teenager and a combat veteran in a class full of adults and some other teens. I didn't really know what to do, but pretty soon I ended up near the top of my cadet class. Being in that position was a bit hellish at times, but I did enjoy the environment of the Academy._

_Each class had a goal that we all wanted to make; those in the top five percent of each cadet class would be able to be a captain (brevetted) of the ship of our choice. Of course it wasn't quite that easy, but I had a goal that I wanted to achieve. I had seen the earlier groups go through the assignment and I had a bit of knowledge of what actually went on, but my own time would prove to be completely beyond my comprehension. I managed to be in the top three percent of my cadet class with only two others above me. They took us into a room where an archaic blackboard had a number of ship names on it. It was a fairly long list of different ship types of the HAF Navy, though a few of the ships I hadn't heard of (I was going to find out soon enough why they were on there). The first two members of my cadet class went up and I saw that one of them got a chance to captain the_ Nemesis. _I wished her good luck since I had served on the _Nemesis_ with Captain Joe Tennant and I knew how he could be at the best of times_. _Another ship was selected and it looked to be a_ Marathon. _I didn't know too much about them other than they were speedy and were a great escort for the _Warlocks_ over both Omelos and Mitoc._

_When it was my turn, I received a message that came in on a neural channel from my nanoware. It was a simply enough message; in fact it had only a single word on it: _Warlord_. I looked and sure enough _Warlord_ was one of the choices. So I went into the room and spoke with the commandant that I wanted to take out the _Warlord_. He didn't quite want me to take this particular ship, but I was intrigued as to why my nanoware had received a message without a valid sender certificate and my other thought was: _why this ship?_ Pretty soon, the commandant relented and let me take the ship for my choice of command. As I went out and erased _Warlord_ from the list, I was questioning my choice and why I was selected in the first place. Soon enough I would know why and I was hooked on my choice…_

_-I-_

_As it turned out, my choice of the _Warlord_ was more than fortuitous. It was a truly magnificent warship; so very much unlike any other ship in the fleet or even more unlike any other ship among the rest of the races of this galaxy (or even those outside it). One of the fleet engineers told me that the ship was patterned after a ship design found in the Walker Archive, something from another dimension or something like that. She looked like nothing else in the Bureau's fleet or even what the Kirishiac might have had at even their height. I was told later on, in my brevet briefing, that I would be captain of the ship and would be solely responsible for bringing it into combat or any other situation. Combat was not expected, but I knew well enough to be on my guard, much like when we jumped on Omelos or the hell that Mitoc turned out to be._

_Starting out it was rather simple. The _Warlord_ was scheduled to go to one of the RRR Worlds near Aldeberan and it was supposed to be a "milk run." Oh how I dislike being told that! We made it through using our transphase drive to get us there quickly. I was truly surprised at how fast the _Warlord_ was in hyperspace and I would be further surprised once we jumped back into realspace as well. I was there with Task Force Serpent and knew just how fast the transphase drive could be, but this seemed to be an order of magnitude higher than expected. I was told by the chief engineer that the drive was the same as on the other ships, it was rather better shielding and more augmenters that were onboard that "pushed" hyperspace around us that made the ship seem so much faster. It was pretty astonishing that this was the technology that the Bureau had on hand. Even more so was the fact that the bridge crew was so small; there was a pair of pilots, a single navigator, a single communications tech, and four weapon operators. That was it! I expected the crew to be far larger, but I was told that the ship had one of the Kirishiac Cores on it. The ship also had the first true AIs on it as well. It was a unique experience losing one of my paychecks to one of the weaponry AIs at poker. My father wouldn't be happy to hear that his son had failed in such a way._

_-I-_

_While we were close to the RRR World that we were headed towards, we picked up a coded transmission that was unknown to us. Deciding to take a look, we engaged the full stealth features of the ship along with our powerful ELINT system. We went in without our gravitic dissipaters since we didn't expect to go into combat, but the gravitic augmenters were online across the ship. The crew knew what they were doing and we quickly exited out of hyperspace using the phase shift drive to keep our jump point from being visible. What we saw was astonishing…_

_A truly massive warship was leading an unknown fleet of ships. It looked like a command ship, or so we thought at the time, or a dreadnought not unlike what the Centauri had in their fleet. The fleet was odd to my not as experienced eye; it looked to be composed of disparate elements from at least three different species. This thought was born out later after closer inspection. Several of the ships looked to be shaped not unlike a wedge or a thimble and were built around what appeared to be particle weaponry; powerful looking, but not so much so once our scans revealed their true nature. Some of them looked to be missile carriers and the main warship carried a little bit of everything on it. It looked vaguely familiar, not unlike something I had seen in a history presentation from one of the wars the Centauri were involved in when humanity was just leaving our world behind._

_It finally clicked when the Kirishiac Core showed a 91% correlation to an Orieni _Paragon Command Ship_ and I remembered hearing the reason why the Centauri did not help us out against the Dilgar, it was because of one of their scout ships spotted a massed Orieni fleet near their border. It looked like the Orieni were in the midst of a war game or FleetEx (Fleet Exercise) and was trying to fit in the other races that were joined with them. We watched them for a bit and made sure that the recorders were online and fully capturing as much data as we could get. Their energy signatures were on the weak side for most of the ships and only the large Orieni ship could be a tough enough encounter for us._

_After a quick conference among the command crew about what we should do; with responses ranging from getting out of there to taking them all out, the choice came down to me. The Kirishiac Core recommended taking out the fleet since the ship was strong enough to take them on, but I wasn't so sure about that. I was a bit timid since this was my first command experience, aside from being in charge of a squadron of _Auroras_ so long ago over Omelos and later over Mitoc, and I truly did not want to screw it up by losing my first warship command. After long enough, I made my decision: "let's go in." My hope was that it wouldn't be my last decision._

_With those words, the _Warlord_ was made ready for combat. The gravitc augmenters were all brought online and the gravitic dissipaters were as well. I was surprised by how many of each was on the ship. This was far more than what even the most paranoid _Warlock_ commander would mount and that didn't even taking into account the number of ELINT systems. The rather small armament onboard surprised me, but it was fully brought online and we were ready for combat. It only seemed small when compared to the variety and number of guns on a _Warlock_ that I was used to. Pretty soon we came out from a quick hop into hyperspace and entered the system with the enemy ships. They became our enemy and I truly pitied them that distinction. Enemies of mankind did not survive for very long, though the Dilgar were a special case._

_-I-_

_The _Warlord_ came out of the jump point in the same manner as all other Bureau ships, completely without any fanfare and with deadly purpose. I always wondered what the other races in the galaxy felt when we did this maneuver, but I had never thought to ask anyone. Maybe the next time I was on one of the _Babylon Stations_, but my thoughts went back to the battle to fight. The Rogolon (after detailed analysis we identified these ships) fleet was made up primarily of cruisers and some smaller ships; probably destroyers and frigates (it was odd that the other races considered corvettes as frigates, but our size conventions were not the same as the rest of the galaxy). The Usuuth fleet looked to be mostly cruisers and a few of what appeared to be bombardment ships or specialty assault ships. The Orieni ship was fully studied and while it had plenty of guns and hefty armor protection, it was also rather slow and the guns would take a long time to be prepared to fire again._

_Our appearance scared them enough that their FleetEx ended and the ships tried to reform into an attack formation. We actually let them reform into their disparate fleet elements. I don't know if it was some kind of mercy for them or us being unnaturally cruel, but we let them have a few moments before we went into combat against them. The speed in hyperspace didn't really prepare me for just how fast the _Warlord_ was in normal space. We accelerated with the fully gravitic drive system to a speed that few other ships short of the First Ones would have been able to do and it felt great. The inertial compensation on board the _Warlord_ caused the crushing G-load to be felt as less than half a G; it was something that I had done often enough when I piloted by _Aurora_. It was good to feel the G-force a bit, otherwise you might try something stupid and that could get you killed._

_It was another dumb thought, but we were a bit cocky, so we let them fire first. It didn't really matter much that the only active defensive measure that we had was our gravitic dissipaters. The Rogolons favored plasma weaponry and missiles, lots and lots of missiles. It almost looked like what we had done to the Dilgar with how many missiles they fired. Unfortunately for them, fortunately for us, none of their missiles were gravitic in nature nor were they nuclear. It was all "conventional" explosives and they did as much damage as a spit wad does against a man's skin. The Usuuth with their particle weaponry were little better as they were fairly powerful, but had horrendous aiming capabilities or recharge rates. Everything fired at us was simply stopped by either the gravitic dissipaters or were denuded of any acceleration by the gravitic augmenters in their secondary mode. Even the _Paragon_ with the massed missile and gauss weaponry could do little against our ship. Their particle weaponry was paltry for such a large ship and genuinely surprised me.  
_

_My simple comment of "Our turn" went out over the communications system without my even realizing just how much nanoware was really used to control the ship. I had wondered why the bridge had been so quiet and it was at that moment that I realized that the ship could only really be controlled through my nanoware with any real chance of success. The hyper awareness afforded by the nanoware blossomed in my mind as I surrendered my thoughts into the cold embrace of my nanoware. Once that was in my mind, the _Warlord_ sped forward through the hail of nuclear missiles (Orieni) and "conventional" (Rogolon) along with enough solid projectiles that came no closer to us than what we wanted them to do. That had to hack off the Orieni as they were a bit like us in regard to their love and use of ballistic weaponry. The gravitic augmenters really made their life hell when they were trying to destroy our ship. They even brought their particle weaponry on us in a quick roll to bring their broadsides into position. Their aim was reduced by the heavy ELINT gear operating in ECM and ECCM modes._

_My first thought centered the Rogolon ships in the crosshairs (mental) of the secondary guns. Four beams shot out and every ship that was "touched" by them, they disappeared from view. The molecular slicers were truly brutal and I had a brief thought (sent by the Kirishiac Core to us all) of a Shadow ship using the same weaponry against a similar ship. That ended any thoughts of compassion for the Rogolons. Their complete lack of any active defensive measures, aside from armor; armor that they thought was strong enough, made them little more than target practice for us. Their ships were neatly bisected and we simply ignored the Usuuth ships at that point. Their ships weren't up to the same standards as the Rogolons and it was a simple slaughter and not any form of combat as I had hoped to use against an opponent, though I knew that compassion would be thrown to the winds against any other opponent._

_The Orieni captain must have realized how bad the situation really was when he saw what was left of the Rogolon fleet. The fleet had some of the Orieni's _Steadfast_ Missile Ships and they had been cut to pieces by our secondary weaponry. Of course they didn't know that it was our secondary weaponry, we had planned to bring to bear the last of our weaponry to put the _coup de grace_ on them. Communications picked up an attempt by the Orieni to communicate with their homeworld, but our ELINT gear was putting out so much electronic noise that the message was blocked. We did copy the full bit of it, any bit of intelligence was worth having (or so the Bureau's Spooks are fond of telling us) and it was interesting to see who our foe was. Communications was able to upload a virus into their system and we quickly had full access to their entire network and we were even able to get their command codes (that bit of information was sold at great cost to the Centauri; we got more than our full measure from them for it)._

_Looking at the Orieni ship, I "saw" through my nanoware the power generation capability of the ship. I saw the weapons suite. I saw that they had no chance against us. I knew what they would do given time and I knew that they were lackeys of the Vorlons. That "simple" thought was enough for the AI onboard. It quickly showed me what it had found there in the system; hidden away under a cloak, it had remained hidden even from our sensors since it was in a passive state. It was a Vorlon transport. I guess our ELINT gear wasn't quite as good as I had originally thought, then I realized that we hadn't been searching for anything hidden. They must have heard that one of their lackeys was in trouble and I didn't even think that they would should compassion and aid them. I didn't know that they even cared (blatant sarcasm on my part here, unless you missed it from my tone) that much for their puppets. They had been trying to make us puppets of theirs for long enough. I guess they finally decided to drop the situation. Of course it could have also been how vociferous we denied them for so long and with lots of weapons fire._

_Leaving the Vorlons out of my mind for the moment, I put my mind back on the situation at hand. We had an Orieni ship that we were trying to deal with and we really needed to take it out before the Vorlons could interfere. The main gun was powering up the whole time and was fully loaded with a specialty singularity shell. Imagine my surprise that the _Warlord_ had a heavily modified super heavy coilgun, not unlike the one normally found on the _Babylon Stations_. It could fire huge projectiles for planetary bombardment, but those rounds were of little use against most warships (some of the less advanced races could be hit, but that was a waste of such a large round) in the galaxy. The ability to fire specialty rounds is what really made it so useful to us. The singularity round was basically an old Mk I Gravitic Singularity Reactor that had been stripped down and made into a projectile with a limited power supply to keep it running. It could suck a _Babylon Station_ into the maw of the naked singularity (depending on where the round hit on the station and assuming that the round had enough power) and I knew that the _Paragon_ we were attacking had no chance against it._

_At the last moment, I decided to use the main gun and follow it up with the singularity round. It was pretty unique since the barrel of the super heavy coilgun also housed a larger version of the molecular slicer cannon. I had thought that the weapons suite was on the "light" side when I first saw, but after watching the heavily armored _Flame of Purity_ get sliced in half by the beam made me a believer in my ship. The drifting remains were sucked into the singularity and nothing was left after it finally ran out of power. The Usuuth ships were running towards the Jump Gate in the system and I had to destroy them as well. Nothing could be told about what we did. I didn't like destroying Jump Gates, but what we did couldn't get out. Another slice of the main gun and the Jump Gate was no more. The explosion was nasty and I did not want to be anyone who was relying on navigation from the Gate, but it was finally over._

_The command codes that we had gleaned from the _Flame of Purity_ were good enough to get us into the Orieni's command network once we left the system and journeyed a bit closer to Orieni space. Communications and Astrogation were told to keep track of each system we passed by to see if we could gather more intelligence to sell to the Centauri or for use by the Bureau. We eventually got to one of their heavily defended sectors and plugged into their network. The _Flame of Purity_ was officially late and nothing had been found of either the Rogolon or Usuuth fleets with it. The Orieni fleet command was running scared since the _Paragon_ represented the only ship to survive against the Centauri and now the famed ship was no more. Evidently the ship's commander had been a survivor as well and his loss had thrown the Orieni's religious leadership into a panic. _

_We left them behind knowing that our allies, the Centauri, would be safe for a little while and that our own bit of the space between the Centauri and the Orieni was safe as well. The only problem had been the Vorlon transport that had followed us and only left when we engaged the transphase drive once we got into hyperspace. How little did we know the chaos experienced by the Vorlons and it was all caused by our ship's appearance. I think it was the Kirishiacs who really pushed for this design, but I was happy that my first time commanding a warship did not end in defeat._

_-I-_

_We got back to the staging area and I was surprised to see that the _Warlord_ wasn't the only ship of her class there. I saw at least four other ships and there appeared to be a large number of secondary support ships of a similar nature, but all ships that I had never seen before (at least until I laid eyes on the _Warlord_ that first day)._

_The briefing following our operations was at first not believed, at least until they saw the full holographic details. I guess the Bureau command staff there didn't expect much at all from my time on the _Warlord_, but they were amazed. A relatively untested ship with a brevetted captain on what they considered an extended test phase was not expected at all to have gone into as much combat as we did. I didn't consider it combat at all, but they were pleased by the results. The ships I had seen outside were part of a massive task force that was forming up for an operation that I didn't know about (yet, that was) and I was intrigued by what I saw. Little did I know that I would go to the ends of the galaxy and see some truly amazing things._

***-EH-***

**Vorlon High Council Chambers**

All those present in the chamber felt, for the first time for so many of them, fear that their ancient enemies had returned. They had thought that all of their dimensional gates had been destroyed so long ago, but records from that time period were not reliable.

Ulkesh Naranek was the sole voice of dissension. "He" truly did not believe that the ancient enemy could be back, at least not without their intervention. Kosh Naranek was the one who had seen the ship in action.

"I have seen what it could do. The Young Races could not stand against it at all. It was as before, they could move swiftly and struck hard. I tried to scan them, but their shielding prevented me from verifying their presence. "

"Then, you lack sufficient evidence Kosh."

"While I do not have the 'evidence' that you say that I lack Ulkesh, I did sense a great deal of malevolence towards us. I fear that if they come out before the event is to happen, we will not be able to ensure the continuance of the Circle."

All present softly uttered "_The Circle_." Each of the Vorlons knew that the Circle had changed, but they truly did not understand the changes already wrought. That would come all too late for them.

**AN2:** After spending a long week on a family vacation (without internet access); I do have a treat for all of you. I had plenty of time to write out a few ideas that I had about the fighters in use in the HAF Navy and Bureau 13's Navy. Presented here is an excerpt from a book released by the New Avalon Press for the Hegemony as a whole. Some of these fighters have appeared already in the story and some will have their role soon enough.

_The Starfury: Past, Present, and Future_

_Tiger_ Starfury

Acknowledged as the first "true" fighter in production by the Hegemony, the _Tiger_ is actually the third Terran fighter in the Starfury line. The old _Aries_ and _Flying Fox_ (both of which saw action against the Centauri) were the start of the HAF Navy's Starfuy line. It would be with the _Tiger_ that the HAF Navy would have their first dedicated multirole fighter.

Combining a single gravitic drive with a pair of gravitic-enhanced plasma engines, the _Tiger_ is a fairly nimble and responsive fighter. Compared to other fighters, only those of the more advanced races are faster and more maneuverable, but against any other power the _Tiger_ reigns supreme. The edge that the _Tiger_ possesses comes from the robust armored airframe and heavy weapons compliment. Carrying a spinal light coilgun and two ultra-light PPCs (Pulsed Particle/Coilgun), the _Tiger_ can threaten lightly armored ships with ease. Indeed this ability was shown several times during the war against the Dilgar. The thinly skinned Dilgar ships were especially at danger from even lone _Tigers_.

Power comes from a single Energy Captor Unit and is usually sufficient for most combat situations, but during moments of high usage each pilot does have to prioritize between weaponry and maneuverability. The onboard weapon stations, specifically the under fuselage mounts, allow the _Tiger_ to carry a wide variety of graviton ordinance and is the sole reason why the fighter has remained in service during the Dilgar War. Those few remaining _Tigers_ still fly with Reserve units or with demonstration teams.

_Nova_ Starfury

Based off the old _Tiger_ Starfury, the _Nova_ uses a hybrid drive system. Combining a quartet of gravitic drives (three more than the _Tiger_) along with a single gravitic-enhanced plasma engine (which is also thrust vectored) gives the _Nova_ a higher acceleration rate and more maneuverability than any other Terran fighter at the time (or any other fighter in known space at that time as well).

Forgoing the wider body design of the _Tiger_, the _Nova_ features a quad wing arrangement with the gravitic drives at the tip of each wing. Additional verniers are mounted around the gravitic drives and provide additional maneuvering capability. The gravitic drives are arranged around the fighter's center of gravity making it highly maneuverable, while the plasma engine further improves maneuverability. Keeping the same Energy Captor Unit as the _Tiger_, the _Nova_ is able to wring out more performance due to the single gravitic-enhanced plasma engine. It is the sole user of the deuterium from the Energy Captor Unit, unlike the _Tiger_ which has two engines and had to split the fuel between the two of them.

Two different variants of the _Nova_ were developed and they are based around the PPCs (Pulsed Particle/Coilgun) mounted on the fighter. One variant featured four ultra-light PPCs and the other had only a pair of light PPCs. With the only difference being the caliber of the coilguns, the helium output is used in different ways. The first variant uses the "traditional" five round burst for the ultra-light coilguns, while the second variant uses a larger ten round burst along with a larger projectile caliber. Each of the four wings also has a large internal bay than can hold up to five graviton missiles (for a total of twenty). These graviton missiles are a smaller version than normally on HAF Navy ships and are used mostly for dealing with other fighters.

Additional hard points (three of them) mounted on the lower fuselage allow the _Nova_ to carry full size graviton missiles or torpedoes for strike missions. Additional smaller graviton missiles can also be carried, but are usually the first to be fired before the fighter begins dogfighting.

_Aurora_ Starfury

The _Aurora_ Starfury came from a different source than the other Starfury designs; it came not from necessity but rather from "just because." Bureau 13's design agency made the decision to not develop another super heavy like the _Nova_ and chose to "think outside the box" with their new design. The new _Aurora_ was designed as technology demonstration fighter first and foremost with combat capability as a secondary concern. The _Aurora_ was built to fully integrate each pilot directly into their fighter using their nanoware. Full scale nanoware is the only way to pilot the _Aurora_, though the fighter does include manual controls when necessary.

Dispensing with a Newtonian or even a hybrid system, the _Aurora_ uses a fully gravitic drive system. The addition of Shadow derived Energy Diffusers (the result of close to a century of development by the Bureau on discovered Shadow ships) in the form of spines mounted on the sides of each fighter. Even though externally the fighter has multiple spines (anywhere from six up to nine of them), only two pairs are mounted on each _Aurora_ and gives them the ability to absorb a great deal of punishment in a dogfight. When combined with the residual shielding inherent with a gravitic drive system, the _Aurora_ has a long lifespan in combat and can even be used against capital ships without too many problems.

Another piece of reverse-engineered Shadow technology is the main gun of the _Aurora_. Mounting a molecular slicer; itself a drastically up-rated hypergraviton cannon, the _Aurora's_ main weapon is steerable and capable of killing every known fighter (_Nova_ included). It is also capable of damaging capital ships and when an entire squadron is used _en masse_; even cruisers have to worry about them. The utility of the weapon is limited by the power distribution network on the _Aurora_ and many pilots have to utilize shutdown routines of the Energy Diffusers in order for the fighter to continue functioning.

The unique nature of the fighter as a technology demonstrator has resulted in the Dilgar War as the sole combat experience of the _Aurora_. Taken out of service aside from a few models that are little more than museum pieces, the systems tested on the fighter live on with its descendants.

_Thunderbolt_ Starfury

During the Dilgar War, there was a dire need for a dedicated aerospace fighter in the HAF Navy. The HAF Army did have their _Lightning II_ air superiority fighter, which also had a modicum of space capability, but it was not enough. Both the HAF Army and Navy needed a true air/space fighter and the lessons learned following the Dilgar War would be used to create such a fighter. While the _Lightning II_ had been a good choice at the time, it was several generations out of date. The _Aurora_ was a test bed design and the high technology (and reliance on nanoware) used on it made it a poor choice to replace the _Nova_ and _Lightning II_. The combination of weaponry and high maneuverability of the _Aurora_ was well liked and the new _Thunderbolt_ was expected to combine together all those aspects wanted by both the HAF Army and Navy.

Working off the airframe of the _Nova_, the new _Thunderbolt_ was conceived as an air/space superiority fighter. At first designed around a single pilot, the addition of a turreted antimatter streamer forced designers to add in a dedicated gunner. The pilot would have control over the fighter as before along with the rest of the armament and the gunner would have control over the turreted weapon system. Using a molecular slicer, the same as carried by the _Aurora_, as the main gun gives the _Thunderbolt_ the ability to take on any target. The later addition of the antimatter streamer makes it even deadlier. Unlike the _Nova_, the _Thunderbolt_ lacks the wing bays for graviton missiles, though it does have several hard points under each wing and the fuselage. Instead, the _Thunderbolt_ has a single ultra-light coilgun on each wingtip that is AI controlled.

Mounting the same gravitic drives as the _Nova_, the _Thunderbolt_ adds a second gravitic-enhanced plasma engine to give the larger fighter a slightly higher acceleration rate than the older _Nova_. In order to provide enough power, fuel, and ammunition supplies for the new armament and engines the powerplant of the _Nova_ was heavily augmented. Mounting a pair of Energy Captor Systems (instead of the single on the _Nova_) and an Mk VI Quantum Singularity, the _Thunderbolt_ has plenty of power for combat. The Quantum Singularity was needed due to its output of antimatter for the new antimatter streamer that is mounted on the underside of the fighter in a turret.

When compared to the other fighter designs in the galaxy, the _Thunderbolt_ outperforms and outguns all of the "younger" races. Against First One fighters (or even warships), the _Thunderbolt_ can give a good accounting for itself. Quickly the _Thunderbolt_ came to be well respected by the enemies of mankind due to the powerful weaponry and its multirole capabilities.

_Mustang_ Starfury

A joint project that was built alongside the _Thunderbolt_, the _Mustang_ is perhaps the deadliest light fighter in the galaxy. Combining the high technology common in the Hegemony on a light fighter chassis along with two different external appearances, the _Mustang_ is a unique fighter design. It exceeds the flight performance and armament of the Centauri's _Sentri_ and remains the sole possession of the Hegemony.

Much like the _Aurora_, the _Mustang_ uses a fully gravitic drive system, but lacks the spines of the older fighter. Internally both the HAF Navy's and Bureau 13's _Mustang_ is nearly identical (aside from the nanoware interface used by Bureau 13), but that's where the similarity ends. The HAF Navy variant is similar in appearance to the _Thunderbolt_ to keep a thematic similarity to keep the enemies of mankind wondering about the origins of the fighter. Bureau 13's variant is styled to match the _Warlord_ and the specialty escorts that were developed for that program. Indeed the Bureau's fleet makes use of their new _Battlemaster_ as the fleet carrier to carry the _Mustang_ into battle, while the HAF Navy has use of _Warlocks_ and the older _Avengers_.

The main armament of both variants of the _Mustang_ is the antimatter streamer, though in this case it is not turreted as on the _Thunderbolt_. The fighter uses a single Energy Captor System with an Mk VI Quantum Singularity to produce enough antimatter for the main weapon to use in combat. The excess deuterium from the Energy Captor System is shunted to the Quantum Singularity since the _Mustang_ uses a fully gravitic drive system. The combination of the heavily damaging main gun with a high degree of maneuverability makes the _Mustang_ a deadly foe in combat. The sole downside, as expressed by many pilots, is that the _Mustang's_ design precludes the ability to carry graviton ordinance into combat. When used properly, the _Mustang_ is an excellent light fighter and dangerous when used against a number of enemies.


End file.
